Smoking bans

Facts Passive smoking

The benefits of a house without cigarettes

We spend more time in our homes than anywhere else. The cigarette smoke releases harmful particles that can cause cancer and other serious diseases to us and our children. The children are even more affected than us, because their bodies are still developing. Being exposed to these harmful fumes greatly increases the risk of them contracting serious respiratory diseases that can affect them all throughout their lives or intervene in the normal growth of the lungs.

The air filtering systems inside our houses cannot actually filter the air clogged with cigarette smoke so well. Blowing the smoke away from the children, smoking in another room or opening the window may reduce toxins exposure but won't protect the kids from the implications of a disease their are not responsible for.

The greatest benefit of course is that the diseases causes by passive smoking will surely not affect you, especially if you choose the places where you spend your free time very carefully.

  • Your house will smell a lot better. The food will taste better.
  • You will spend less time, energy and money trying to remove the ill effects of the cigarette smoke from the curtains, walls and furniture in your house.
  • You will spend less money on drugs and sprays that soothe the effects of cigarette smoke on yourself and your family.
  • Even your house pets will feel much better breathing a fresher air.

The benefits of a workplace without cigarette smoke for the employers and the employees

For the employees

Now there is a special law which protects you against this! According to law 349/ 6 of June 2002 (see the Legislation section) smoking is prohibited in public places, including your work place! Smoking is only allowed in places especially designed for this, with air-conditioning, which would not let bad air into your workplace. Ask your employer to abide by the law!

  • A workplace without smoking helps to develop a healthy and secure work environment.
  • Both personal efficiency and the health of the whole team will visibly improve.

For the employers

  • Your direct health costs will reduce significantly.
  • The costs will automatically reduce when smoke, matches, cigarette ends and ash disappear.
  • The desk equipment, furniture, curtains will have a much longer life span.
  • The risk of a fire is greatly reduced.
  • The problem with cigarette smoke is that it gets everywhere. Separating smokers from non-smokers in the same room may reduce the density of smoke in places where people do not smoke but this is not enough. Opening windows, filtering the air, air cleansing systems, they all can reduce but not prevent exposure to the others' cigarette smoke. We have to make sure that non-smokers live and work in a smoke-free environment by ensuring and creating "tobacco-free" public places.

Real Facts

  • Every day, in the USA more than 3000 teenagers are smoke their 1st cigarette and thus make their 1st step onto becoming a regular smoker. One 3rd of them will die due to smoking related diseases.
  • 40% of the teenagers who regularly smoke have tried at least once to quit.
  • FuSmoking is a disease of the children. 89% of the people who try to smoke try it before they are 18.
  • 90% of the new smokers are children or teenagers. These new smokers replace the ones that quited or died prematurely because of smoke related diseases. Teenagers are encouraged to smoke their 1st cigarette by cigarettes producers, friends, and the possibility to get them very easily (some merchants ignoring the law).
  • Nicotine causes addiction; actually the risk of becoming addicted is 1 in 2 while the risk of becoming dependant on intravenous administrated cocaine is 1 in 4.
  • 42% from the people that smoke 3 cigarettes a day will become regular smokers.
  • 70% of the teenagers, if the could choose again, would choose not to smoke.
  • IOne in five deaths in the USA is caused by a smoking related disease.
  • More than 400.000 people die annually because of smoking related diseases. That is more than alcohol, crack, heroine, crime, suicide, car accidents and AIDS altogether.
  • At least 4.5 million children between 12 and 17 smoke!