Non-Smoking Paris?

Without getting political, what do you think of when someone refers to France? Perhaps you would say the Eiffel Tower, the beret, outdoor cafes and of course smoking. Every nation has it's own typecast and smoking has always been one associated with the French but now it seems as if that may be changing. North America, as we all know, has been implementing non-smoking laws for years and now it is happening globally.

Perhaps you would like to know how exactly France is changing? Smoking is generally well tolerated, but is now restricted to specific areas. Cigarettes are barred from a good number of places, in particular enclosed public buildings and public transport.

If you are staying at a hotel you can smoke in your hotel room unless there is a specific sign forbidding it, but the hotel must conform to required ventilation standards. The public areas, like the breakfast room, reception and the corridors are generally no-smoking areas. All youth hostels are as a general rule entirely non-smoking.

When visiting restaurants they are obliged to provide designated smoking and non-smoking zones. As you go in you will be asked in which section you prefer to be seated. However, depending on the layout of some places, tobacco odors cannot always be prevented from drifting over to the no-smoking zone. Cafes and clubs remain the places where the law may be not so strictly adhered to: mutual respect is ultimately the only rule.

Smoking is strictly prohibited by law in shops, cinemas, theaters, hospitals and public services.

Smoking is against the law in schools, universities and other educational establishments, including the open spaces (playgrounds, stadiums...).

French law prohibits smoking in public transport, throughout the Paris and Ile-de-France network: metro, bus, RER, suburban trains and trams. Railway and metro stations are also entirely non-smoking, although you may come across certain recalcitrant individuals, despite the no-smoking signs and anti-smoking campaigns. Taxis are usually non-smoking.

Finally, at the office, some companies provide a special smoking area for their employees, but more and more office buildings have totally excluded any smoking at all. For example in the business district of La Defense, some high-rise blocks are completely cigarette-free.

I'm not sure that we will ever see the day when the entire world has become smoke-free but the fact that France is now becoming more strict should send all the smokers a strong message. The time to quit is now.

Alcohol And Drug Rehab Centers Will Treat Cigarette Smoking If New Law Passes

New York could become the first state requiring all outpatient addiction treatment programs to help their clients quit smoking under proposed legislation. The law would only encourage alcoholics and drug addicts to quit smoking, not require it. Those who agree to quit smoking would be provided with treatment including drugs to relieve cravings, while patients who refuse to quit could still be treated for other addictions as long as they don't smoke in the treatment facilities. The ban would also apply to treatment center workers. Whether this will increase the success rates of alcohol and drug rehab is in dispute.

New Jersey has required residential addiction programs to treat nicotine addiction and be smoke-free since 2001, but officials in New York say it would be the first state to require smoking cessation efforts in outpatient programs, which account for two-thirds of the 1,100 treatment alcohol and drug rehab programs in the state. Programs in New York that fail to comply with the smoking regulations could lose state certification and would have to stop treating clients.

It has generally been thought that asking patients to quit smoking while fighting addictions to alcohol or drugs like heroin or cocaine is asking too much. But state officials say a deeper understanding about addiction "triggers" and the dangers of tobacco itself have changed the consensus. Karen M. Carpenter-Palumbo, the commissioner of the substance abuse agency that oversees all state-sanctioned alcohol and drug rehab facilities, said in a written statement, "We now know that's not true. Including tobacco dependence while treating other addictions actually leads to higher recovery success rates. We need to focus on the overall wellness of our patients and not ignore this deadly addiction."

However, the higher recovery success rates Carpenter-Palumbo refers to are disputed in the scientific community. One recent study from the University of Minnesota found that recovery rates are actually lower if patients are weaned off cigarettes while they are trying to break free of alcohol or drugs. And according to Dr. Richard Hurt, the director of the Nicotine Dependence Center at the Mayo Clinic, most studies have shown that treating nicotine addiction along with alcohol and drug addiction has no effect on treatment effectiveness.

According to the U.S. National Institute against Alcohol Abuse (NIAAA), between 80 and 95 per cent of alcoholics smoke cigarettes - three times higher than among the general population. And a recent Research Society on Alcoholism study using advanced magnetic resonance imaging on human brains found that cigarette smoking not only worsens alcohol-induced brain damage (which was already known) it also causes brain damage by itself. And there are strong links between some forms of cancer and the combination of drinking and smoking.

So it seems uncertain at this point if quitting smoking will help alcohol and drug abusers recover from their addictions and stay clean after completing alcohol or drug rehab. But even if only for the improvements in long-term mental and physical health, it seems to be a good idea to try quitting smoking while recovering from addiction at an alcohol or drug rehab center.

Regulations For Smoking Shelters

In making your preparations for the introduction of the Smokefree provisions on 1 July 2007 in the UK, it is advised that you are particularly careful with any plans for outdoor smoking shelters that could lead to significant wasted expenditure if it goes wrong. This guide aims to help you make the right choices, although it should not be relied upon as a definitive interpretation of the law of the UK Smoking Ban

What counts as a smoking shelter?

There is no legal definition, and you don't have to provide one. It will be illegal to smoke or allow smoking in enclosed or substantially enclosed premises, therefore a smoking shelter has to be less than substantially closed. This means that 50% of it's sides must be permanently open.

The location is also important, because building a structure like this with an open side too close to a wall or other obstruction could mean that it no longer complies. (the law refers to premises rather than structures, and an adjacent wall could be deemed to be part of the premises of your shelter.

Some other problems to avoid

    * You may need planning permission, depending on the size of the smoking shelter
    * You can't provide temporary covers for any of the open parts-this stops them being counted as permanently open
    * Customers outside your premises may cause noise or other nuisance problems for neighbours, and this may trigger a review of your certificate/licence
    * You will need to provide some form of bin for your customers litter

There are alternatives for smoking shelters such as :

    * Awnings
    * Umbrellas and Parasols
    * Golf umbrellas for customers to borrow
    * One Scottish pub has recently been loaning waterproof coats to customers, with "stolen from Buddies Bar" printed on the back

Another common mistake made by some in Scotland and Ireland has been to cover an existing yard with an awning. Because the yard has 4 walls and the awning provides a roof covering,even temporarily, the yard falls into the category of substantially enclosed premises even when the awning is withdrawn.