Smoking bans benefit nonsmokers and smokers alike. Nonsmokers are exposed to significantly less secondhand smoke, while smokers tend to smoke less,have greater cessation success, and have increased confidence in their ability to quit. These effects are greater under a comprehensive ban than under a partial one. When indoor smoking areas are allowed, ventilation is inadequate to eliminate secondhand smoke, and the reduction in smoking among smokers is less significant.

Smoking bans, relatively inexpensive to implement, produce immediate economic benefits to employers in the form of reduced accidental fire risk, lower insurance premiums, and less employee absenteeism.

Support is high for smoking bans in public places. In many countries with few regulations on smoke-free areas, the public is overwhelmingly in favor of establishing clean indoor air laws. In regions where smoking bans have been mandated by law, employees, customers, and business owners report high compliance and satisfaction with the results.

There is no safe level of exposure to secondhand smoke/ environmental tobacco smoke. Attempts to control the toxic and carcinogenic properties of secondhand smoke by ventilation are futile, requiring tornado-strength rates of air flow. Among nonsmoking adults living in countries with extensive smoke-free law coverage, 12.5 percent were exposed to secondhand smoke, compared with 35.1 percent with limited coverage, and 45.9 percent with no law, and only 5 percent of the world’s population is covered by comprehensive smoke-free laws.

United States, 2007: Nonsmoking employees left unprotected from workplace secondhand smoke exposure had elevated levels of a tobacco-specific carcinogen in their bodies. Ireland, 2004: With smoke-free legislation, bar workers’ exposure to secondhand smoke plunged from thirty hours per week to zero.

China, 2007: Ninety percent of those living in large cities support a ban on smoking in public transport, schools, and hospitals. Eighty percent support a ban in the workplace.

Monitor tobacco use and prevention policies
Protect people from tobacco smoke
Offer help to quit tobacco use
Warn about the dangers of tobacco
Enforce bans on tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship
Raise taxes on tobacco

Building on the first-ever global public health treaty - the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) - the World Health Organization (WHO) in 2008 issued a comprehensive country-level report on the global tobacco epidemic. This report provides data from 179 countries covering 99% of the world’s population and sets baselines for implementation and enforcement of the six evidence-based and cost-effective policies of the WHO MPOWER strategy. Currently only 5% of the world’s population is fully protected by any one of the MPOWER interventions and no country implements and enforces all of them. By taking action to implement MPOWER, the leaders of governments and civil society can create the necessary environment to protect children from tobacco, help people quit tobacco use and save millions of lives a year.

The final version of the online Tobacco Atlas will have information on MPOWER steps related to the issues portrayed on each map.