Is the public the people, or The State?

In the name of public health, the FDA is banning trans fats.

When I first heard the term "public health" sometime in my youth,  I thought it was about protection from dangers that could harm anyone and everyone: contaminated air, water, or land; contagious diseases.

I thought public health had something to do with the public!

Turns out, when most people talk about public health, they refer to what people choose to ingest or smoke. Unhealthy choices, they say, will drive up health care costs.

But whose health care costs?

Health care is expensive because of supply and demand. The State restricts the supply of medical professionals, prohibits some kinds of medicine, and regulates procedures and facilities.

All these restrictions mean there's there's less health care to go around. Naturally, prices go up.

So it's not our "health care costs" that concern The State. If it cared about that at all, it wouldn't restrict the supply.

 It is, rather, The State's own health care costs that it's worried about. After all, it must pay for the "free" health care it promised to various large constituencies.

That's why it insists on supposedly healthier and safer options for you and me. Our liberty is subservient to The State's bottom line.

One can't help but conclude that in the mind of those who would ban trans fats and a multitude of other things,,,

The public isn't the people, the public is The State.