Mexico to ban all smoking in public – indoors and out

MEXICO has banned smoking on all its beaches, as well as in hotels, parks, restaurants and offices, under some of the world’s toughest anti-smoking laws.

The new laws covering all public places came into effect yesterday, restricting smoking to private property.

The ban, which follows on from legislation in 2008 that required nonsmoking areas in public, passed unanimously in the senate last month and in the lower house in April.

Tobacco advertising, sponsorship or promotion will also be restricted, including a ban on displaying cigarettes in shops. The sale of e-cigarettes was banned in May last year.

A million people a year die of smoking-related illnesses in the Americas, and the new restrictions have been welcomed by the WHO’S Pan American Health Organisation.

In Mexico, just over 63,000 people are killed by smoking every year, accounting for 10 per cent of all deaths in the country. Tobacco use declined from 13.5 per cent of the population in 2002 to 7.7 per cent by 2009, but the rate has since plateaued.