SPAIN could soon banning smoking on all beaches as it presses ahead with tough new measures.
The Spanish Ministry of Health has confirmed a new crackdown on both smoking and vaping and says people’s health has to be protected.
One of its new priorities is to resurrect the anti-smoking plan which will include extending smoke-free spaces to terraces, beaches and cars in the presence of minors and pregnant women.
Health Minister, Mónica García asid: “We must look at the law again because we cannot turn our backs on the only measure that can give the population more years of life and a better quality of life, which is to reduce smoking.”
The Comprehensive Plan for the Prevention and Control of Smoking 2021-2025 was finalised a year and a half ago but has not yet seen the light of day.
The Ministry of Health says it wants to “remove it from the drawer” and expand the ban on tobacco consumption to more areas.
“The first steps are to get it out of the box,” said Ms García.
“We will have to look at each of the cases and each of the assumptions.
“What we plan to is study what that plan is going to be, if it needs to be expanded, if it needs to be modified, but we do have a firm commitment to those recommendations.”
The Minister of Health also referred to vapers, pointing out that “nicotine releasers must be included in this regulation”, similar to the measures around tobacco.
She said “vapers will have to have precise regulation” and “that is adapted to all the regulations that exist regarding tobacco.”
The plans are already causing controversy.
José Luis Martínez-Almeida, mayor of Madrid, said prohibiting smoking on terraces would be “nonsense.”
He added: “From a health point of view, smoking, of course, is not the most recommended activity, but from there to prohibiting it from being done outdoors seems crazy to me.”
Various holiday hotspots in Spain have already expanded their no-smoking beaches with the Balearics now having 28 of them.
Caló des Moro was the first “smoke-free” beach in San Antonio, Ibiza, with others including Ibiza’s Playa de Santa Eulalia de Rio and Playa de Talamanca, while in Menorca smokers have to resist in Binissafuller and Platja Gran.
However, smoking generally is a huge problem with 118million cigarette butts dumped each year in the Balearics alone.
Anyone caught smoking on a beach where it is banned faces fines of £1,700.
France has already confirmed plans to ban smoking on all the beaches, ahead of plans to make the “first tobacco-free generation” by 2032.
Other beach bans include only wearing bikinis on the beach in Barcelona and Majorca, with fines ranging from £260 to £500.
