Freedom and seatbelts

I'm in favour of all those laws that are meant to protect us, like the prohibition to drink and drive, the obligation to respect the speed limits or the need to have a current MOT certificate. They make sense: if you abide by these laws, you're safer and the people around you are safer too. But then there are other laws which I don't understand completely: you must have your seatbelt on, when driving a car, or your helmet, when driving a motorbike. Here, the only person in danger is the driver, so these measures address his or her own safety. But why does it have to be compulsory? I mean, if you want to drive around without wearing a seatbelt and don't mind to die if you have an accident, why shouldn't you? You're not very likely to kill anyone with your head when you're thrown up in the air anyway.

But that's not the thing that really annoys me. I understand that you're safer doing that, and in fact I would never think of not using the seatbelt when driving, but then, what about smoking? If the government cares so much about your health, why don't they impose a ban on tobacco? They know that it's very harmful, and indeed force tobacco companies into displaying health warning messages on their cigarette packages. If it's so harmful, why not ban it? The answer is, the government doesn't give a f**k about our health. People have to wear seatbelts and helmets because all those who get badly injured in accidents cost the government a lot of money; I'm sure that, if every person that had an accident without a seatbelt died straight away, its use wouldn't be mandatory. As for tobacco, lung cancer and other diseases caused by its consumption cost the health system an awful lot of money, BUT in this case the government obtains much more than that through taxes on tobacco products. So they have to tell you that you shouldn't smoke, but they don't dare to ask you openly to quit smoking, lest you should indeed do it. If all of a sudden everyone followed the advice found on the cigarette packages' health warnings, it would mean a tragedy for the government. Poor old guys.