20 years after the Sirchia law, which extended the ban on smoking to all enclosed spaces, a new tightening is on the way against traditional cigarettes but also against the more recent e-cigarettes and heated tobacco products.
The draft with the new bans, already announced by Health Minister Orazio Schillaci, would be ready, as anticipated by the newspaper La Stampa.
The new rules should provide for a ban on smoking, including e-cigarettes, in dehors, at public transport stops and also in parks if children and pregnant women are present.
Contrary to the Minister of Infrastructure and Transport, and Deputy Prime Minister, Matteo Salvini, who defines the squeeze as "exaggerated", while applauding the introduction of new medical and oncologist bans.
Already last January, illustrating the programmatic guidelines of the Ministry of Health, Schillaci had announced his intention to extend the smoking ban "to other outdoor places in the presence of minors and pregnant women; eliminate the possibility of equipping smoking rooms in closed premises; extend the ban also to the emissions of new smokeless products (electronic cigarettes and heated tobacco products); extend the advertising ban to new products containing nicotine and devices for heated tobacco products".
In the draft, the smoking ban for all types of cigarettes would concern not only the interior of the premises but also the tables outside (smoking is only permitted if the establishment has an area reserved for smokers).
Stop to blondes and e-cigs even at bus stops
metro, buses, trains and ferries are open, while smoking lounges in airports should be eliminated.
Ban for all types of cigarettes even in parks in the presence of children and pregnant women, but the ban could become total.
The new prohibitions, not yet definitive and subject to modifications, could be envisaged in a government-initiated bill, but the text could also be included in another provision during the approval stage.
An announced squeeze that sees Matteo Salvini against: "Electronic cigarettes are helping many people to abandon the normal ones. As a former smoker who quit 4 years ago, the ban on smoking them outdoors appears exaggerated. What do you think?", He wrote on Twitter.
The oncologists took the opposite opinion: It is a "positive decision - says the president of the Italian Association of Medical Oncology (Aiom), Saverio Cinieri - because it is scientifically proven that smoking favors the onset of many types of cancer. also related to cardiovascular and neurological pathologies, therefore the extension of the bans is undoubtedly acceptable".
Cinieri also agrees with the extension of the bans on e-cigarettes: "We have no long-term studies on their effects,
but undoubtedly e-cigarettes, increasingly fashionable among the very young, are becoming a vehicle towards nicotine addiction precisely in young people who mistakenly believe that this type of cigarette does not cause addiction". He also welcomes the squeeze the president of the Italian Society of Cardiology (Sic), Pasquale Perrone Filardi: "It is a principle of attention to protect non-smokers as well.
According to recent data, in fact, there is no zero risk and even a brief exposure to passive smoke can represent a danger to the heart". However, bans are not enough according to Fabio Beatrice, director of the Mediterranean Observatory of Harm REduction (MOHRE) and founder of the Anti-smoking center of the San Giovanni Bosco hospital in Turin."
Other measures are needed, starting with the introduction of risk reduction strategies through the use of e-cigarettes, which are 95% less toxic, for smokers who cannot quit".
"The minister's willingness to extend the bans also to e-cigs is surprising, which - concludes the expert - should not be equated to traditional cigarettes".
