NOTICE the U.S. ranking compared with Japan, Hungary, and the United Kingdom. How can the Japanese smoke more but live longer than Americans?
In the U.S. poor smokers are more likely to die young than rich smokers
The smoking rate among men in Japan is nearly twice that of the U.S. yet people in Japan live on average 4 years longer.
It's not that smoking isn't important to health. It is, but other social conditions are even more so.
A study of heart disease among British civil servants showed that people in the lowest employment “grade” were still 2.5 times more likely to die than those in the highest grade, even after adjusting for smoking, cholesterol, blood pressure and other factors.