Foreign tobacco companies may have undermined new laws
China will soon take the dramatic step of banning cigarettes in hotels, restaurants, shopping malls and most other indoor public spaces, 1 May, but the huge shift away from public smoking comes with so little in the way of punishment that the sting is missing from the new laws. China has one of the world’s highest smoking rates, over 30 percent of the adult population.
If observers in China are complacently shrugging, the government, which signed a 2005 convention with the World Health Organization, is slowly but surely putting in place several measures to curb smoking, such as raising taxes on cigarettes. Producers of TV shows and films were told at the start of 2011 to curb smoking scenes after a survey showed that 33 percent of teenagers wanted to smoke after seeing people do it on-screen.
Smoking is estimated by the government to have killed 1.2 million Chinese in 2005, but that annual rate could triple by 2030, they fear.
Tobacco accounts for 7 percent of government revenues in China, according to Australia’s Sydney Morning Herald, a possible factor in slowing down the adoption of new no-smoking measures, the newspaper implies, but The New Yorker magazine published an article 25 March that points to efforts made by foreign tobacco manufacturers to seriously undermine the Chinese government’s efforts.
Alexandria, Egypt is about to enforce old regulations: no smoking in public buildings. The move is the first step in a two-year plan to ban smoking completely in the city. Egyptians consume 19 billion cigarettes a year, making them “the biggest Arab consumer of cigarettes”, according to the BBC.
Swiss-wide smoking ban - Photo Flickr Hance Gessell
Update 2 May A new Swiss federal smoking ban went into effect 1 May.
The new law seeks to bar smoking from all public places but allows it in some confined, closed areas. Cantons may enforce looser or stricter rules.
World Radio Switzerland carries a conversation featuring activists on both sides of the debate.
A study published Tuesday 13 April in the Canadian Medical Association Journal shows a strong link between a ban on smoking in restaurants in Toronto and a sharp drop in the number of hospitalizations for cardiac and respiratory problems, dow 39 and 32 percent respectively.
Toronto has reduced public smoking in three phases, with a ban on smoking in the workplace in 1999, then in restaurants in 2006 and in bars in 2009. The first and last appear to have been accompanied only by slight changes in hospitalizations, whereas the restaurant ban appears to have had a significant impact. “I think this reflects the fact that a lot more people go to restaurants than bars,” Dr Alisa Naiman, one of the study’s authors, told The Globe & Mail. She points out that other legislation, such as an increase in tobacco tax, also played a role.
Just over 21 percent of the adult population in Canada smokes, according to the newspaper.
Paleo 2009
Nyon, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The largest open-air music festival in Switzerland, Paleo, may go smoke free.
Smoking will be banned in certain areas during the 2010 festival, Philippe Vallat, Paleo’s executive director, told 24 Heures in an interview.
Vallat and Daniel Rossellat, head of the Paleo Music Festival, told the newspaper they must comply with canton Vaud’s ban on smoking in public areas.
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Voters in canton Vaud decide Sunday 27 September if they want to create a single canton-wide police force that combines the existing cantonal police and the various municipal forces. Lausanne’s voters will also decide where to put two new stadiums that the city wants to build.
On the same day in Geneva, voters will decide yet again on smoking in public places, and they will vote on whether or not to lower taxes. Also on the ballot: a change in the annual automobile fee. The city wants to penalize carbon dioxide-emitting passenger cars.
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Turkey joins the growing list of countries to ban smoking in public places such as restaurants and bars, starting 19 July. Turkey’s smokers consume 100 billion cigarettes a year, and half the male population smokes. It is the world’s eighth-largest cigarette market. Already bar owners and restaurateurs are worried the effect the ban could have on their business. A fine can be worth the equivalent of $45 for a smoker and a first-time offense for a bar-owner can cost $365. Smoking in offices and public buildings was banned 15 months ago. Polls indicate that 95 percent of the population is in favour of the ban. BBC, Financial Times
The Pentagon in the US is considering banning all smoking by soldiers, including those in battle, and stopping sales of cigarettes at military bases. A study done for the Pentagon is recommending the ban saying that in the short term it harms battle readiness and in the long term the cost to the health of soldiers is high, which also creates a financial burden for the government. CNN
© 2007 Vivre sans Fumer
Neuchatel, Switzerland (24 heures, Fre) – Smokers have invaded the streets outside bars and restaurants since the canton of Neuchatel banned smoking in all public places 1 April 2009. Smokers are unhappy. Some restaurant-owners too, reports 24 heures, although owners the newspaper spoke to say their complaints are tempered by the realization that some clients now stay longer after their meal, or come with the family. Bars and discotheques generally have nothing nice to say about the new law, reports 24 heures, and their neighbours complain that customers go onto the street to smoke, leave cigarette butts lying around and annoy the neighbours at night.
Reuters video, India’s smoking ban India is the rare large country where smoking is still growing, and its 240 million smokers make it the world’s third largest market, but smokers now face fines for smoking in any public areas, part of the government’s efforts to reduce the one-in-five smoking related deaths.
