A high tax on sugar? How sweet it would be

On my last day of radiation, I drove up to the NYU Women’s Cancer Center and saw a man leaning against the front door, smoking. I wondered if he was waiting for his wife or mother who was inside getting treatment. I wondered how he could possibly smoke a cigarette on a day when someone he knew was getting therapy for cancer.

Smoking always seemed reckless and self-destructive to me, at least since we learned its causal relationship to cancer and heart disease. I used to feel some compassion for those struggling with the addiction to nicotine. But, post-cancer treatment, I feel less tolerant. Good health is a blessing; we only get one of these bodies to run around in.

A pack of cigarettes costs nearly $15 in New York City, and still people smoke. Teenagers still smoke, demonstrating the never-say-die, don’t-get-in-my-face attitude of adolescents that leads to the fatal lung cancer and heart disease of adults. The public-service announcements are out there, but the learning curve is far from perfect.

Cigarettes must be banned, totally and unequivocally. The argument that it is some kind of right to kill oneself by sucking in carcinogens and smoke is specious. That right is trumped by my right to breathe clean air and to get good health care at a reasonable price. Treating people who give themselves cancer is an onerous and unreasonable burden on the system.

Last week I got my Medicare card — and the bill. My Medicare, parts A and B, along with my prescription drug supplement and my supplemental health insurance, come with a hefty price tag. My husband and I still work, so we have to pay extra. And that’s OK. But I don’t want to pay for others’ self-indulgent habits.

What isn’t OK is that health care costs are driven in large part by people who have made themselves sick by smoking, overeating, avoiding exercising, drinking too much and consuming gross amounts of sugar. To encourage those who don’t eat healthy or exercise, I’m comfortable taxing the products that contribute to chronic disease and taxing the individuals who abuse their bodies — or, to put it in a positive light, offering discounts to people who take care of themselves.

I have my own Health Care Wish List: