Japan is understood for its nutritious diet and spectacular life expectancy. But it is usually a smoker’s paradise. Although the variety of people who smoke has dropped by a 3rd over the previous 20 years, greater than 17 million Japanese smoke frequently. The authorities try to make extra public areas smoke-free, however it’s an uphill wrestle as outdated habits die laborious. Gabriel Chaneac, Alexis Bregere and Justin McCurry report.
France banned smoking in bars and eating places in 2008. But in Japan, people who smoke can nonetheless puff away in smaller institutions.
“Ninety percent of our customers are smokers,” says Yasuhiro Ogawa, who runs a bar in Tokyo. “Many prefer to drink and have fun rather than having to go outside to smoke.”
Japan’s authorities is making an attempt to cut back the variety of bars and eating places that let smoking to guard different clients and workers from the results of second-hand smoke.
Smoking is already banned on most of the capital’s streets, forcing folks to get their nicotine repair in designated smoking areas. It’s a unique strategy from that taken in different international locations.
Conflict of curiosity
The proportion of grownup people who smoke has dipped from round 25 p.c to 16 p.c over the previous 20 years. But tobacco merchandise nonetheless threaten public well being, inflicting greater than 130,000 deaths a 12 months.
Even so, the struggle on smoking has but to get critical.
Pricing and packaging are a part of the issue, says anti-smoking campaigner Manabu Sakuta, noting that the typical packet of cigarettes “costs under 3 euros and features no shocking photos”.
Critics say the federal government is smooth on smoking as a result of it has a 30 p.c stake in Japan Tobacco, the world’s third-largest producer of cigarettes – a battle of pursuits meaning many Japanese will hold lighting up.
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Originally revealed on France24