Now the Brits too <a href=”

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/health/story.jsp?story=494817

“>seem to be looking at a ban on smoking in bars and workplaces. The random ’statistic’ pulled out of an ashtray to justify such a loutish, intrusive policy? The one thousand lives allegedly lost to ‘passive smoking’ in the UK each year.

Why be so modest? Back in December, 2002, Nurse Bloomberg claimed that his smoking ban in New York City would save one thousand lives annually in the Big Apple alone.

Both ’statistics’ can be wrong, but they can’t both be right. So which is it?