Smoking Ban
Tony Blair's government plans to publish legislation to ban smoking in all public places in England except pubs that don't serve food and private clubs. The ban covers enclosed spaces, workplaces, restaurants and pubs serving food. Other pubs and private clubs will be exempt, so long as smoking isn't permitted in the bar area where staff serve customers.
English pub owners are concerned that the ban might discourage customers, and the exceptions for pubs that don't sell food might encourage smokers to go to their competitors locations instead.
At least 114,000 people in the U.K. die each year from smoking-related illnesses, which accounts for a fifth of all deaths. About 70 percent of smokers in the U.K. say that they'd like to quit, as reported by the British Heart Foundation. About 26 percent of British women smoke and about 28 percent of British men. About a fifth of the U.S. population smokes.
In other smoking news, a study by the research group RTI International found that smoking among adults in New York has fallen to an all-time low of just over 18 percent last year. That's down from just under 21 percent in 2003. Cigarette use among high school students in New York declined from 27 percent to 18.5 percent between 2000 and 2004.
Cigarette smoking has also been linked to causing Erectile Dysfunction in Men.
