High schools, universities, workplaces, restaurants, bars and cafes … These collective places are still too conducive to passive smoking, according to the Weekly Epidemiological Bulletin (BEH) of Public Health France, published on May 25, 2016. This document presents the results of the 2014 Barometer, entrusted to the Ipsos polling institute, which examined exposure to tobacco of 15,635 French smokers and non-smokers. It emerges that a high proportion of people are exposed to cigarette smoke on a daily basis in collective places, sometimes public, yet subject to strict regulations since 2007 and 2008. A worrying finding since passive smoking “increases the risk of ischemic heart disease by 27% and increases the risk of lung cancer among non-smokers“, according to experts from Public Health France. And in exposed children,”the risks of respiratory infections andasthmaincrease by 55% and 32% respectively“.
Three quarters of pupils and students exposed to smoke
In schools and higher education, more than three-quarters (76.8%) of pupils and students over 15 years of age report having been exposed to tobacco smoke from other pupils at school, high school or university, in the past 30 days. In addition, smokers were more often exposed (88.1%) than non-smokers (70.1%), because of “group phenomenon” since “smokers are brought together in the interval and are thus exposed to the smoke of other smokers in the group“, explains the BEH. Nevertheless, the question of the Barometer 2014 did not relate to the exact place of the exhibition, which probably”leads the students questioned to count the exposures observed in the vicinity of the establishment, in particular during intercourse“warns the BEH.
Likewise, the survey does not make it possible to distinguish an exposure in places where smoking is prohibited (inside and outside the premises in schools and high schools, inside university premises) of an exhibition in places without prohibition (outside the premises within universities, including interior courtyards and green spaces). “Despite these reservations, this result remains worrying and probably calls for concerted or even joint action on the part of the ministries responsible for health and national education.“, however, underlines the BEH.
The same was observed in the workplace, where 15.5% of the employees questioned declared having been exposed to tobacco smoke from other employees inside the premises. The different professions are not affected in the same way: workers are the most affected with 28.2% of people exposed, against only 7.1% among executives.
More checks in social spaces
And even outside of school or work, passive smoking is very present. Thus, in the last 30 days, 8.7% of participants were exposed to tobacco smoke inside a restaurant, 30% inside a café, bar or restaurant. pub and 40% inside a nightclub. “Despite the laws prohibiting smoking in public places which came into force in France in 2008, six years later, these high exposure rates suggest a certain weakness in respect of the regulations. smoking bans in public places“, deplores the BEH. To reduce these exposure rates, the experts recommend a greater number of checks in places of conviviality to ensure compliance with the anti-smoking law, and a strengthening of preventive actions on the dangers associated with passive smoking.
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