Turkey to extend smoking bans

Turkey has said it intends to extend a tobacco smoking ban previously applied only in enclosed public places to outdoor areas, according to a story in the Hurriyet Daily News citing the daily newspaper, Sabah, and quoting the Turkish health minister Mehmet Müezzinoğlu.

Under the law, smoking would be banned outside shopping malls, in playgrounds, in certain public gardens and on certain walkways.

The new smoking bans in outdoor areas are due to come into effect this year.

The announcement of the bans coincided with the release of the results of a study showing that, last year, one out of four businesses in Turkey did not comply with the ban on smoking in enclosed public places that was introduced by the Justice and Development Party in 2009.

According to a story in the Zaman newspaper, research by Johns Hopkins University and the Turkish Health Institute (SED) has found that businesses such as bars, cafés and restaurants frequently violate the smoking ban by replacing ashtrays with drink cans and putting up folding roofs over public spaces. In addition, some cafés and bars make announcements to the effect that smoking is allowed after a certain time.

The team conducting the research made their observations in four districts of İstanbul in 2013, 2014 and 2015. Almost half of the observed businesses were found to have flouted the law in 2013, a figure that dropped to 30 percent in 2014 and to almost 25 percent last year.

Speaking to the Zaman on Monday, Professor Elif Dağlı, the chairman of the SED, said that even though it was promising that the violation rate had decreased significantly, it was still troubling that one out of every four businesses in Turkey violated the law last year, the sixth year of the ban.