Czech Republic: Doctors Call on ODS to Back Total Smoking Ban in Pubs

Source from:  Prague Daily Monitor (cz)  04/03/2013

A group of Czech doctors criticises the Civic Democratic Party (ODS) for its opposition to the absolute ban on smoking in restaurants that Health Minister Leos Heger (TOP 09) has proposed.
 
"You deliberately prefer private ownership to health of not only guests of these restaurants but also their personnel," the doctors headed by surgeon Pavel Pafko write in an open letter addressed to ODS deputy chairwoman and lower house head Miroslava Nemcova and available to CTK.
 
Pafko is known as a surgeon who removed a malignant lung tumour to former president Vaclav Havel in the 1990s. Havel was a heavy smoker.
 
The letter was also signed by professor Jan Pirk, head doctor of the IKEM cardiology department, and Eva Kralikova, head of the centre for tobacco addiction at Prague's General Teaching Hospital.
 
The ODS leadership recently rejected the proposed absolute ban, saying it would limit ownership rights of private entities.
 
The doctors argue that the state is obliged to care for people's health and that it should intervene even in private facilities in case of need.
 
"Moreover, restaurants all around the world increased their profits as soon as the smoking ban took effect," the doctors write in the letter. In fact, the ODS harms the pub owners when it is against the smoking ban, the doctors argue.
 
"We can understand the politicians who see the money from taxes on cigarettes in the state coffers. But we cannot understand those who do not see the money needed to correct the consequences of smoking. Unfortunately, it has been proved that the costs are higher," the doctors write.
 
Heger admitted previously that his effort at introducing a total ban on smoking would probably not win enough support in the Chamber of Deputies.
 
Under Heger's plan, smoking would be allowed only in patios and other outdoor spaces of pubs as of next year.
 
The ODS recommended that its ministers and lawmakers do not support such a restriction. The coalition government of Petr Necas (ODS) plans to discuss Heger's proposal later this month. Enditem