08 Aug 2008

In the seven years since winning its bid to host the 2008 Summer Olympic Games, China has utilized the Olympics as an opportunity to implement policies that will leave a lasting mark on the country and its people. One of the most important legacies of the Olympics may be its impact on public health, due in part to the decision of China’s leadership to make the Olympics tobacco-free.

Following the dramatic opening ceremony on August 8, Beijing’s tobacco-free Olympics are underway.

In 2004, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao committed to making the Olympics tobacco-free following an example first set by Calgary in 1988. Over the past year, Beijing and the mainland co-host cities of Shanghai, Tianjin, Qingdao, Shenyang and Qinhuangdao have all taken steps to implement smoke-free policies that extend beyond Olympic venues and that, in many cases, will continue to be implemented long after the Olympics are over. Hong Kong, China’s seventh co-host city, has also implemented a smoke-free law.

• With a government directive that took effect May 1, Beijing for the first time completely banned smoking inside hospitals; on the campuses of primary and secondary schools; in cultural institutions such as cinemas, concert halls, and museums; and in office spaces and meeting rooms of government agencies, associations, enterprises, and public institutions.

  In addition, the municipality for the first time required restaurants and hotels to establish smoke-free areas covering 50 percent of their premises, a transitional measure which the municipality says will lead to 100 percent smoke-free environments in all public places, workplaces and public transportation by 2011. Beijing banned smoking in taxis in October, 2007. It has also removed all outdoor tobacco advertising.

  Find out more about the Beijing Smoke-Free Directive >>

• Shanghai is strengthening enforcement of its existing smoke-free regulations while simultaneously drafting new tobacco control legislation that will be submitted to the Shanghai People’s Congress as early as 2009. The municipality also banned smoking in all taxis during the Olympics and pledged to remove Olympics-related advertising by tobacco companies.
• Tianjin banned smoking in all taxis in April, 2008, followed by a ban on smoking in all primary and middle schools in May. In addition, the municipality is experimenting with smoke-free public places such as hotels and Internet cafes in its Tanggu District.
• Qingdao, in addition to declaring public places citywide smoke-free during the Olympics, implemented a permanent “smoke-free campuses” plan which will make 30 percent of the city’s schools smoke-free this year and all schools smoke-free within five years. Qingdao will also ban smoking in all hospitals over the next three years and has pledged to remove tobacco advertising for the Olympics.
• In May, 2008 Shenyang permanently banned smoking in hospitals and classrooms and restricted smoking in restaurants, hotels and certain workplaces. Shenyang also removed all tobacco advertising in honor of the tobacco-free Olympics.
• Qinhuangdao announced in April that it would ban smoking in taxis, buses, government work units and certain hospitals within the 100 days prior to the start of the Olympics. Hotels rated three stars and above must have non-smoking floors. Qinhuangdao also pledged to ban all outdoor tobacco advertising.
• Hong Kong, the seventh co-host city, implemented a far-reaching smoke-free law in 2007. When the last provisions of the law go into effect in 2009, Hong Kong will have one of the most comprehensive smoke-free laws in the world.

These tobacco control measures in the Olympic co-host cities represent a significant step forward in protecting public health and improving the quality of life for China’s 1.3 billion people. China is home to one-third of the world’s smokers. One million Chinese people die each year from tobacco-related disease, and lung cancer rates have skyrocketed by 465 percent in the past 30 years.

The smoke-free measures also come at a time when China is actively implementing the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, the global public health treaty that it signed in 2003 and ratified in 2005. If China follows through with full implementation of its treaty commitments by 2011, as it has pledged to do, the Olympics will leave an enduring public health legacy.