Smoking is hazardous to your health. It’s posted on every pack of cigarettes, cigars and any tobacco product you buy, as well as magazines and billboards on every corner. We get it America.

Researchers and doctors have told us that smoking causes lung cancer, heart disease, emphysema, and may complicate pregnancy, but it is also legal to buy, smoke and even chew if you want.

According to the American Nonsmokers Right Foundation, as of July 1, 79.6 percent of the U.S population lives under a ban on smoking in workplaces, restaurants and bars.

I am a smoker, and I do consider it a privilege and my right. I understand the ramifications of smoking, but in the end it is my choice.

Why sell this product in our state, and than make it so hard to enjoy the privilege? Students who smoke just want a sense of relaxation when they put that cigarette in their mouth. They’re not intentionally trying to hurt anyone’s health.

Another issue is secondhand smoking.

A study conducted by the environmental protection agency in 1993, titled Respiratory Health Effects of Passive Smoking: Lung Cancer and other Disorders, launched the lies about second hand smoke.

It falsely stated that roughly 3,000 people die as a consequence to second hand smoke each year.

However, in 1998, a federal court found that this study was not valid as the environmental protection agency (EPA) had failed to use appropriate procedure.

The EPA basically deviated from acceptable scientific procedure to ensure a preordained outcome.

That is absolutely unfair.

Smokers should have rights as well; no one has ever stopped to think about the smoker’s liberties being taken away. Or if the students are really being bothered with the smell of smoke around campus.

According to the University of Kentucky, they instituted its ban just this fall only to face the new student movement called “Students for Liberty,” out of protest against the banning cigarette smoking on campus.

Lance Wheeler, president of the University was quoted by the Lenington-Heald leader as saying “Not everyone has been quick to embrace university of Kentucky’s policy.”

If smoking on campus gets banned, most EC smokers won’t be happy about it. I won’t, that’s for sure.