Name: REINTRODUCE THE BAN ON SMOKING IN PUBLIC PLACES POLICY BRIEF

Description: It is necessary that the Government of Montenegro immediately starts the legal procedure for amending the Law on fees for the use of tobacco products, and electro-acoustic and acoustic devices in catering facilities, which in fact abolished the ban on smoking in public spaces. It is necessary to abolish Articles of the Law allowing the use of tobacco in catering facilities, which  prevents the full implementation of the current Law on Restriction of the Use of Tobacco Products.

Namely, the Law on Restriction of the Use of Tobacco Products states that “smoking in the public and workspace, as well as exposure of other persons to second-hand tobacco smoke is prohibited”.Public spaces also include catering facilities1. These provisions were to be applied from the mid2016. However, they were repealed by the last adopted legal changes instead.

As indicated by the World Health Organization (WHO), the Law on fees for the use of tobacco products, and electro-acoustic and acoustic devices in catering facilities should not have been voted out in this form. In addition, the effect of this Law does not have a time-limit, although the timelimit was determined in the previous valid versions of the law2 defining the fees for the use of tobacco products. Therefore, not only is this Law harmful, but, this time, its effects are not timelimited.

We recall that, Montenegro is one of the leading countries in the world regarding the negative statistics about the use tobacco products. According to the World Health
Organization and IPSOS (2016), 41% of adult citizens of Montenegro are smokers. Montenegro is one of the leading countries in the world in the consumption of cigarettes per capita. Consumption of tobacco products and exposure to tobacco smoke is in direct correlation with the worrying high number of people affected by cardiovascular and malignant diseases.

We emphasize that most citizens support the ban on smoking in the public space (60% in 2016 according to the WTO), including a large number of people who consume
tobacco products.

Sažetak prijedloga javne politike o ponovnom uvođenju zabrane pušenja u javnim prostorima ENG

Authors: 

NGO Juventas

CEMI

Date: 2018