Smoking Ban - History

History

One of the world's earliest smoking bans was a 1575 Mexican ecclesiastical council regulation which forbade the use of tobacco in any church in Mexico and Spanish colonies in the Caribbean. In 1604, King James I of England published an anti-smoking treatise, A Counterblaste to Tobacco, that had the effect of raising taxes on tobacco. The Ottoman Sultan Murad IV prohibited smoking in his empire in 1633. Pope Urban VII also prohibited smoking in the Church in 1590 followed by Urban VIII in 1624. Pope Urban VII in particular threatened to excommunicate anyone who "took tobacco in the porchway of or inside a church, whether it be by chewing it, smoking it with a pipe or sniffing it in powdered form through the nose". The earliest citywide European smoking bans were enacted shortly thereafter. Such bans were enacted in Bavaria, Kursachsen, and certain parts of Austria in the late 17th century. Smoking was banned in Berlin in 1723, in Königsberg in 1742, and in Stettin in 1744. These bans were repealed in the revolutions of 1848. The first building in the world to ban smoking was the Old Government Building in Wellington, New Zealand in 1876. This was over concerns about the threat of fire, as it is the second largest wooden building in the world.

The first modern attempt at restricting smoking was imposed by the then German government in every university, post office, military hospital, and Nazi Party office, under the auspices of Karl Astel's Institute for Tobacco Hazards Research, created in 1941 under orders from Adolf Hitler. Major anti-tobacco campaigns were widely broadcast by the Nazis until the demise of the regime in 1945.

In the latter part of the 20th century, as research on the risks of second-hand tobacco smoke became public, the tobacco industry launched "courtesy awareness" campaigns. Fearing reduced sales, the industry created a media and legislative programme that focused upon "accommodation". Tolerance and courtesy were encouraged as a way to ease heightened tensions between smokers and those around them, while avoiding smoking bans. In the USA, states were encouraged to pass laws providing separate smoking sections.

In 1975, the US state of Minnesota enacted the Minnesota Clean Indoor Air Act, making it the first state to restrict smoking in most public spaces. At first, restaurants were required to have No Smoking sections, and bars were exempt from the Act. As of 1 October 2007, Minnesota enacted a ban on smoking in all restaurants and bars statewide, called the Freedom to Breathe Act of 2007.

The resort town of Aspen, Colorado, became the first city in the US to restrict smoking in restaurants, in 1985.

On 3 April 1987, the City of Beverly Hills, California, initiated an ordinance to restrict smoking in most restaurants, in retail stores and at public meetings. It exempted restaurants in hotels - City Council members reasoned that hotel restaurants catered to large numbers of visitors from abroad, where smoking is more acceptable than in the United States.

In 1990, the city of San Luis Obispo, California, became the first city in the world to restrict indoor smoking in all public places, including bars and restaurants.

In America, California's 1998 smoking ban encouraged other states such as New York to implement similar regulations. California's ban included a controversial restriction upon smoking in bars, extending the statewide ban enacted in 1994. As of April 2009 there were 37 states with some form of smoking ban. Some areas in California began banning smoking across whole cities, including every place except residential homes. More than 20 cities in California enacted park and beach smoking restrictions.

Since December 1993, in Peru, it is illegal to smoke in any public enclosed places and any public transport vehicles (according to Law 25357 issued on 27 November 1991 and its regulations issued on 25 November 1993 by decree D.S.983-93-PCM). There is also legislation restricting publicity, and it is also illegal (Law 26957 May 21, 1998) to sell tobacco to minors or directly advertise tobacco within 500m of schools (Law 26849 Jul 9, 1997).

On 3 December 2003, New Zealand passed legislation to progressively implement a smoking ban in schools, school grounds, and workplaces by December 2004. On 29 March 2004, Ireland implemented a nationwide ban on smoking in all workplaces. In Norway, similar legislation was put into force on 1 June the same year.

Smoking was banned in all public places in the whole of the United Kingdom in 2007, when England became the final region to have the legislation come into effect (the age limit for buying tobacco was also raised from 16 to 18 on 1 October 2007).

12 July 1999 a Division Bench of the Kerala High Court in India banned smoking in public places by declaring ``public smoking as illegal first time in the history of whole world, unconstitutional and violative of Article 21 of the Constitution .The Bench headed by Dr. Justice K. Narayana Kurup, held that ``tobacco smoking in public places (in the form of cigarettes, cigars, beedies or otherwise) ``falls within the mischief of the penal provisions relating to public nuisance as contained in the Indian Penal Code and also the definition of air pollution as contained in the statutes dealing with the protection and preservation of the environment, in particular, the Air (Prevention and Control of Pollution), Act 1981. AFP: Nepal to ban smoking in public places On 31 May 2011 Venezuela introduced a restriction upon smoking in enclosed public and commercial spaces.

Smoking was first restricted in schools, hospitals, trains, buses and train stations in Turkey in 1996. In 2008, a more comprehensive smoking ban was implemented, covering all public indoor venues.

Smoking has been restricted at a French beach - the Plage Lumière in La Ciotat, France, became the first beach in Europe to restrict smoking, from August 2011, in an effort to encourage more tourists to visit the beach.