[fable]

Is the patient being treated via a public medical program? Because if so, I suspect this is controlled by a series of procedures. If it's a privately owned medical facility, then presumably the hospital and the physicians separately could set their own guidelines for this kind of matter.

I can't say how it works in the UK, but in the US we do have physicians groups that will refuse to treat smokers for certain ailments, just as there are some insurance companies that will exclude these treatments if its known the insuree is a smoker. The incident of continuing damage to the lungs by tobacco smoke, for instance (leaving aside all the other problems it causes) is such that my current pulmonologist won't see a smoker. Period. Unfair? Perhaps. But this is a decision many physicians must make, given the overload of patients. If you had to choose from a large number of people to see as regular patients, it stands to reason that those with a vested interest in fixing and maintaining their own health would receive preference.