Spain and France: Smoking outdoors could be difficult to overcome

Some of the old tobacco countries—Spain and France— want to introduce a ban on smoking outdoors to curb the deadly habit among young people. However, this plan may come to nothing.

At the end of May, French Health Minister Catherine Vautrin announced that the government would ban smoking on beaches, in public parks, at bus stops and near schools from July 1 to protect children.

“Where there are children, tobacco must disappear,” Vautrin said in an interview with the newspaper Ouest France .

And for good reason: while less than a quarter of French adults smoke daily today, the number of young smokers is increasing, and around 75,000 deaths per year are attributable to smoking-related diseases.

Spain goes even further. A leaked bill proposes that the country introduce a ban on smoking outdoors on terraces and other public spaces—not only for cigarettes, but also for e-cigarettes and tobacco products containing heated tobacco products.

Health Minister Monica García said she hoped the ban, along with other plans to increase taxes on tobacco products, would put the country “at the forefront of the fight against smoking.”

A long way

According to recent opinion polls, six out of ten French people support a smoking ban in public spaces – similar figures apply to Spaniards, who support the proposal to ban smoking outdoors.

The Commission has proposed an extension of smoking bans for 2024, and more countries—including Italy and Belgium—are expected to introduce strict outdoor smoking laws later this year. However, Europe is still a long way from tobacco-free outdoor public spaces.

Resistance comes from many sides: from industry, from right-wing politicians and from habitual smokers who are notoriously difficult to quit their habit.

Both Spain and France, for example, have extensive infrastructure for smokers that cannot be removed overnight, including ashtrays near benches, in front of workplaces, and in parks and on beaches.

The Spanish Health Minister himself acknowledged that the law still has many hurdles to overcome, including a complicated parliamentary process. In an interview with El País, García said: "I hope we don't give in to the lobbies that, as always, are exerting considerable pressure. And the tobacco lobby is doing its job."

Are bans effective?

When it comes to lobbying, she's right. The Brussels-based lobby group Tobacco Europe opposes blanket bans, which it believes could lead to the stigmatization of smokers and "have negative effects on the economic and social life of a community."

Germany's largest tobacco association, the BVTE, shares this opinion: "This is about patronizing smokers and driving them out of public spaces. The French government hasn't even investigated whether there is actually a health risk for non-smokers in the affected outdoor areas."

According to the World Health Organization, there are "no safe levels" of exposure to secondhand smoke. A ban on smoking outdoors could help reduce the number of preventable deaths related to tobacco use and the burden on health systems. Studies link secondhand smoke to lung cancer and heart disease in non-smokers.

For Lilia Olefir, director of the anti-tobacco organization Smoke Free Partnership, bans are not just about the health risks of passive smoking, but also about making smoking less attractive.

"When smoking bans were introduced in bars, they met with resistance and were seen as radical. Today they are widely accepted," she told Euractiv.

More than bans

For the Alliance contre le tabac (ACT) , France's only major anti-tobacco organization, the ban on smoking outdoors is an "important" step towards a tobacco-free generation by 2032.

A spokesperson for the association stressed that more efforts were needed to combat “the public health and environmental emergency caused by the tobacco industry.”

The NGO pointed to the UK's tobacco legislation as a model for France, which has implemented even stricter measures such as a ban on the sale of tobacco to young people born after 2009.

Olefir of the Smoke Free Partnership agrees: "It is not enough to focus exclusively on individual behavior and leave industry practices unchecked. To counter the tobacco epidemic, countries must act on multiple fronts."

This could include a ban on tobacco advertising, the introduction of plain packaging or an increase in excise duties.

The French government's proposal lacks an explanation of why young people are increasingly turning to tobacco and e-cigarettes, nor any attempt to address root causes such as stress or poverty. Spain, on the other hand, announces a plan in its draft Royal Decree to increase resources for those who want to quit smoking.

Brussels not on the same page

As smoking bans take hold on countries' beaches, pressure is growing on Brussels to further revise its legislation and demand new tax laws that include novel tobacco products. The question is whether the EU should regulate e-cigarettes and other nicotine products in the same way as traditional cigarettes, including for outdoor smoking.

However, this will be politically difficult as the EU Commission has removed tobacco legislation from its 2025 work programme.

Even when Parliament presented a non-binding – largely symbolic – resolution on smoke-free environments in November 2024, which MEPs expected to be passed without major opposition, lawmakers failed to agree on a common line .

Given a pro-industrial bias in EU tobacco laws, the future of outdoor smoking bans across the Union is uncertain – and could very well go up in smoke.

(aw)