Are smoking bans a pharmaceutical attempt at cornering the drug market?

Every society likes to have a "down dog," class of citizen to kick. Anti-smoking sure gave them the means to establish a new one.

No. Smoking bans are aimed at preventing lung cancer, which claims thousands of lives and costs millions in treatment every year. That and thousands more from other cancers, respiratory disorders and heart failure (all of which, incidentally, make money for pharmaceutical companies). It's health authorities, not the pharmaceutical industry, that are campaigning for smoking control.

As for the sources you link:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC201438...

This source does suggest nicotine may have a role in preventing or treating ulcerative colitis. That may well be a legitimate issue to investigate. If so, though, it would almost certainly be delivered through a nicotine patch, a much safer alternative to smoking.

http://www.naturalnews.com/034608_nicotine_brain_f...

"Natural news" is possibly the most biased pseudoscience-fest I've ever seen. I wouldn't trust anything you found there. Even if they aren't lying (which they probably are, as they usually do), it would still only suggest nicotine may be medically useful, not smoking.

http://www.schizophrenia.com/nicotine.benefits.htm

Noticing a theme, here? This again suggests nicotine may be medically useful, not smoking.

The only thing any of these sites might suggest is that nicotine may possibly have legitimate medical use, based on preliminary research. None of these benefits, though, have been demonstrated in a clinical trial yet, so right now the only thing we can say is it might be useful and this should be investigated.

Even if any of these investigations do lead to something, they would result in nicotine being used as a patch of pharmaceutical-grade product. No health authority would ever approve smoking as a prescription medication. If you have a useful medical compound, you administer it in the safest and most convenient way. You don't mix it up with carcinogens and burn it, then try and inhale the smoke. Inhaled medications do exist, but the inhaled route is only used if there is a good reason to use it (e.g. in asthma, where you want to deliver the medication to the lungs without affecting the rest of the body).

No. To put it bluntly, non-smokers hate the smell of cigarette smoke. Also, it's a health risk, because asthma attacks can be triggered by cigarette smoke. And giving someone you don't even know an asthma attack is just plain *rude*.

Don't get me wrong. Smokers are still people, and deserve to be treated with the same respect as anybody else. And I know how hard it is to suppress an urge to light up--seriously, something like 75% of my entire family on both sides used to or currently smokes. In fact, that's why making cigarettes overpriced prescription drugs is just cruel--who the hell can afford $80 cigarettes? That's just taking advantage of an addicted group!

Is there evidence that cigarettes calm people down? Well, duh. Any smoker will tell you that they feel more relaxed after a smoke.

Is not getting ulcerative colitis really worth the risk of lung cancer? Well, that depends. I can tell you that I lost two grandparents, both heavy smokers, to lung cancer. But you're right! They might be dead, but at least they never got an upset tummy!

I see every reply here that doesn't cheerlead for your pro-smoking beliefs gets a thumbs down.

Now light up a pack of Lucky nonfilters and don't forget me!

There are studies to prove whatever you want to prove.

smoking caused lung cancer, my uncle and grandfather died from lung cancers they both smoked