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LETTER: Smoking takes much greater toll 

There is a tragic irony in The Sun's photo of a surgeon with a lighted cigarette jammed into his mask, captioned, "A surgeon wears a mask to protect against SARS during a cigarette break outside St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto."

The Sun's article notes that "the global death toll from SARS was at least 753, out of more than 8,200 infected," for a death rate under 10 percent ("Rule change triples SARS in Toronto," May 30).

Barely a week earlier, the World Health Assembly adopted a treaty to discourage cigarette smoking and reduce the estimated 5 million deaths it causes every year. . .

The math is simple enough. Even a surgeon should get the point.

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