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France to Make Restaurants Smokefree

Nightclub and casino workers still forced to breathe smoke

Parts excerpted from Agence France Press, 8/23/06

France is preparing to clear the air in smoky restaurants and other public areas starting next year, the newspaper Le Figaro has reported. The measure, which could be applied nationally from January 1, 2007, would bring France closer in line with Britain, Ireland, Italy, Spain and Sweden.

"It's going to happen" for France, too, the country's health minister, Xavier Bertrand, told Wednesday's edition of Le Figaro.

The newspaper said the government was planning a decree announcing the new law, but would exempt casinos, nightclubs, and tobacco shops.

"Congratulations to France," says Joe Cherner, President of SmokeFree Educational Services, Inc. "We are thrilled for restaurant workers. We only wish the same respect for health was shown to nightclub and casino workers."

Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin's office stressed, though, that "nothing is yet definitively decided." But it said "the timetable is known", pointing to a parliamentary report on the issue due to be submitted next month (September). "The government will announce its plan in the following month (October). The decree's application could take effect from January 1, 2007," the newspaper said.

News of the possible smoking ban came after a study published Saturday by Britain's scientific review the Lancet which said that smoking triples the risk of heart attacks and all sorts of smoking -- including passive smoking -- was bad for the heart.

France has long shed its image of a country overrun with smoky bars and cafes, though tobacco addiction is still a big problem despite successive government price rises that have made packets of cigarettes among the most expensive in Europe.

Smoking kills 61,000 people a year in the country and another 5,000 die of second-hand smoke, according to the health minister.

French cigarette consumption unexpectedly rose this year after four years of decline. About 30 percent of the French population smokes, more than in any European countries except Greece.