Beijing to go smoke-free by 2015

BEIJING - Authorities are trying hard to make Beijing’s all indoor public places, workplaces and public transport smoke-free by 2015.

Hospitals, schools, theatres, museums, business halls, stadiums, offices of enterprises and government organisations, as well as buses, taxis and subways, should hopefully be smoke-free by then, said Mao Yu, spokesman for the Beijing Municipal Health Bureau.

The municipal government issued a smoking ban in the above places in 2008 ahead of the Beijing Olympics, but the rules haven’t been effectively implemented, Xinhua reported.

“The current smoking-control regulations still need to be improved,” Mao said.

China is home to 350 million smokers, about a third of the world total. It ratified the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control in 2003, pledging measures to effectively curb tobacco use and ban smoking in all indoor public places, workplaces and public transport.