More forceful intervention needed

BUSINESS and social interests do not always run in harmony. Conflict is almost inevitable and we have a long record of appeasement, of tolerating something we might find unattractive because jobs are involved or at least promised.

We seem to accept public health threats more easily than we should too. We may condemn smoking because of its dreadful, unrelenting toll, and introduce stringent controls, but we still spend taxes generated by tobacco sales.

Smoking has been replaced though, by the curse of obesity, especially among children, on the public health to-do list. It is becoming the affliction of our time and is all the more frustrating because it is caused by poor lifestyle choices.