Cities struggling to enforce bans on smoking in public

Students from Liaocheng University demonstrate the harm caused by smoking during a street performance in Shandong province in October. Zhao Yuguo / For China Daily

As China eyes a national ban on smoking in public indoor areas, health and law experts say regional anti-smoking regulations lack the teeth to protect nonsmokers from secondhand smoke.

More than 10 Chinese cities currently have smoking control rules, all of which ban smoking in public indoor areas, said Wang Qingbin, associate professor with the China University of Political Science and Law.

"But implementation of the law is unsatisfactory, mostly because there is a lack of enforcement and awareness of the law," he said at a symposium held by Beijing-based tobacco control campaign ThinkTank and the Tobacco Control Office of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

The municipal-level rules mainly target public businesses such as restaurants, Internet bars, hotels and movie theaters, but do not focus on individual smokers, he said.

Yang Jie, deputy director of the Tobacco Control Office, explained that the city ban is similar to other bans around the world that mainly target businesses instead of smokers.

Zhang Dafan, director of the Shangcheng district health inspection institute in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, said business owners who do not attempt to prevent smoking in their establishments are fined. Smokers, however, are warned on the first offense. A second warning prompts a fine.