Smokers can cause themselves serious health problems. The choice to smoke is made freely and with knowledge of dangers. Smokers should, therefore, expect to pay more for medical treatment than non-smokers. To what extent do you agree with this statement?
Sample Response
Smoking addicts possess themselves with severe health issues. Most of them choose to smoke freelyindependently and while being aware of the health riskswith being aware of health threats. Therefore, their awareness of these risksThereby the awareness of it should prompt themhas to induce them to pay attention to their health. A vast number of patients are getting ill unwillingly, whereas smokersunwillingly, the smokers, on the other hand, knowingly risk becoming illare getting ill knowingly. Hence, it is justifiedHence it is justified that they should be charged more for their treatment. This is mainly because it would at least give them a reason to quit smoking.
Smoking is one of the greatest threats to human healthmost crucial perils to humankind. This poison does not reveal its effectsdoes not expose when it is first usedat first times of using it. The invisibility of it makes it difficult to perceive if suspect consumes it by the people of their environment. The only obvious effect is the bad odour of cigarettes. Although companies have found out a way to solve this problem by putting a gum at the end of each cigarette to chew after smoking, by this way the unpleasant odour has been refused easily. Unfortunately, the dangers do not disappear with the odourdangers are not gone by the odour. With the passage of time, smoking damages the lungssmoking occupies lungs, then the kidneys, heart and the rest of the bodythen kidneys, heart and all the system. This poison takes the victim to the hands of death slowly and patiently. In spite of all the advice and warnings from governments, hospitals and televisionnotions and warnings of government, hospitals, televisions the smoker wants more as he smokes morethe person of abuse wants the more when he smokes the more. There should be a strict regulation so that smokers are inspired to quit smoking. Imposing a higher treatment fee can be one of such initiatives that would force the smokers to quit their nasty habit.
Nonetheless, the government and hospitals have to do their jobs and continue to raise awareness of the hazards of smokingmake awareness of hazards of smoking. The well-known sayingAs the well-known saying ‘prevention is better than cure’ teaches us that being able to prevent the people from smoking is far more beneficial than charging more for their treatment.
Why this response received Band 5.5
The response clearly supports higher treatment charges and offers a relevant deterrence argument, while also recognising that prevention and public education matter. However, much of the long middle paragraph describes smoking's bodily effects and cigarette odour rather than evaluating fairness, personal choice, addiction, or healthcare funding, and frequent language errors obscure several claims. Prioritise a focused argument about responsibility and counter it with a realistic consideration of addiction and equal access to care.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Response
A recognisable position and deterrence rationale are present, but substantial discussion is tangential and the extent of agreement is not evaluated in sufficient depth.
Develop the fairness and cost arguments directly, then consider whether addiction weakens the claim that smoking is always a fully free choice.
Coherence and Cohesion
The response has a basic introduction, main discussion, and qualification, but progression within the central paragraph is weakened by an extended and confusing detour about odour.
Organise separate paragraphs around personal responsibility, deterrence, a counterargument about addiction or healthcare rights, and the final judgement.
Lexical Resource
Some relevant health and policy vocabulary appears, but frequent inaccurate collocations and forced figurative expressions regularly make meaning unclear.
Use precise neutral phrases such as tobacco addiction, known health risks, treatment costs, financial deterrent, preventive education, and access to healthcare.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
Basic meaning is often recoverable, but frequent errors in clause structure, verb forms, articles, pronouns, and sentence boundaries repeatedly strain comprehension.
Write shorter complete sentences with one main idea and verify each subject-verb relationship before adding subordinate clauses.
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IELTS Writing Task 2
Smokers can cause themselves serious health problems. The choice to smoke is made freely and with knowledge of dangers. Smokers should, therefore, expect to pay more for medical treatment than non-smokers. To what extent do you agree with this statement?
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.