Do the Government really want to cure nicotine addiction?

UK tax revenue from tobacco excise and VAT in 2013 was £12.3bn! #QuitSmoking #StopSmoking

Share this article

The last thing most smokers are worried about is the money it costs – yet it’s worth just pausing for a moment to assess who the winners and losers are with regard to the nicotine industry and whether the government really want to cure nicotine addiction. In 2014 research commissioned by Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) indicated that the cost to the UK National Health Service caused by smoking was £2 billion a year with the cost of social care for older smokers being around £1.1 billion a year. That’s a combined cost of £3.1 billion a year.

UK tax revenue from tobacco excise and VAT in 2013 was £12.3bn! So Her Majesty’s Treasury benefits to the tune of more than £9 billion a year! Yet smokers are bullied, and harassed, and made to feel like lepers by a system that views them as a dispensable profit centre.

Since 1990 the annual UK tax revenue from tobacco has doubled. It is destined to always go only in one direction. Up! As nicotine addiction in other forms grows – you can be sure that the treasury will be ready to apply the same taxes to those products. What more predictable and sustainable source of income is there other than an addict.

As a nicotine addict you have to ask yourself – do you really want to be a victim of this scam any longer? Can it really be that the governments of the world are dis-incentivized from curing nicotine addiction and might even be happy to encourage it?

Can you think of a reason why on one hand, international global corporations such as Microsoft, Vodafone, IBM, Ford, Total, Esso, Pfizer, and BMW, to name but a few, regularly contract the services of Allen Carr’s Easyway to Stop Smoking to help their employees get free from their addiction, yet the government, Department of Health, and the National Health Service do not?

In the business world it’s universally accepted that an employee who smokes will cost their employer in excess of £4,000 a year ($5,000+) in lost productivity, increased absenteeism because of sickness, and health costs etc. That fact alone makes acquiring our services compelling in terms of return on investment for our corporate clients, let alone the advantages of having a happier and healthier workforce.

Read more about our Corporate Workplace Programmes

We even offer our corporate clients the same money-back guarantee that we offer our private clients. If their employee doesn’t quit by the time they complete the stop smoking programme, we refund the fee for that employee.

In short – these companies save a fortune by helping their employees to stop smoking.

The growing number of health insurance companies around the world who pay for their policyholders to attend our clinics also save a fortune when they contract our services. The cost of treating their policyholders is dramatically reduced when they stop smoking – as are the former smokers’ premiums. It’s a win-win situation.

When a nicotine addict frees themselves from their addiction it costs the government money…remember the tax yield from nicotine addiction I mentioned earlier. It’s the complete opposite of the effect when an employee or insurance policyholder escapes from their addiction. The employer or insurance company save money.

Can you spot the dichotomy? Can you see how governments might be financially dis-incentivised to help smokers, vapers, or any kind of nicotine addict escape? Perhaps this might suggest the thinking behind governments across the world allowing e-cigarettes to be marketed was great glamour and grandeur on TV, billboards, in newspapers, magazine, and even music videos.

Read more about ‘How to Stop Smoking & Vaping’

#StopSmoking #QuitSmoking #BeAddictionFree #AllenCarr

From the desk of John Dicey, Worldwide CEO & Senior Therapist, Allen Carr’s Easyway