Introduction
The law provides that smoking is allowed in cafés, restaurants and other public eating - places only in areas specially designated for smoking.
Smoking in public places is bad for passive smokers and childrens too.
It is bad when parents smoke and then smoking is health hazard for children because they blow these smokes too.
Doctors believe smoking is the major cause of different serious illnesses. I think that the main problem is illnesses because passive smokers can got these illneses too.
Smoking in public places
The café owners who were fined were mostly unaware of the law On the Restriction of Sale, Advertising and Consumption of Tobacco Products whose objective is to protect the right to clean air unpolluted by tobacco smoke.
As we know people are worried about the environment as a result of the harmful effects of human activity. Some of these activities cause pollution and some are destroying the environment .
Common causes of damage is smoke from factories, car exaust fumes, aerosol cans and dumping waste is seas and rivers. People waste
gaspers in these places and it is bad for environment.
The law provides that smoking is allowed in cafés, restaurants and other public eating-places only in restricted areas provided for smoking. Areas provided for smoking are separate or marked-off sections equipped with air conditioning and have signs with the appropriate informative notice or symbols. If a public place has only one room for all visitors, smoking can be allowed only in a part of this room.
Taking into consideration the course of the police raids, the Health Promotion Centre concludes that non-smokers do not usually protect their right to breath clean air and do not forbid smoking in their presence as well as rarely inform the police about such breaches of the law.
The law provides that smoking is allowed in cafés, restaurants and other public eating - places only in areas specially designated for smoking. The prohibition of smoking is to be indicated with an informative notice in the state language using the sign Smoking Forbidden (white letters on a red background), the permission of smoking is to be indicated with a similar informative notice in the state language using the sign Smoking Permitted (white letters on a green background) or symbols approved by international practice on smoking control.
The Health Promotion Centre believes that such police raids during Health Week will also help non-smokers avoid passive smoking and damage to their health in the future.
The Health Promotion Centre in cooperation with the Riga Municipal Police Force carried out raids checking on the observance of the rights of non-smokers in 40 cafés within the framework of "Health Week", 5 of these cafés did not have separate areas provided for smokers and non-smokers, therefore administrative reports of the cases were drawn up in accordance with the Administrative Offence Code of Latvia.
According to the survey on Habits Affecting the Population of Latvia, carried out in 2000, men are more often subjected to passive smoking in public places - 46%, but women - 23.7%. Even more people are subjected to passive smoking at home - 51%, from which 55.4% of the men and 48.4% of the women. According to the survey the level of education has a decisive role. While in families with primary education smoking does not occur in the presence of others in 39% of the cases, in families with higher education the proportion is 60% of the cases.
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