The smoking ban that isn’t

We live in a strange world. A (foreign) man was jailed last week for 10 years for growing cannabis plants in Gozo while Maximilian Ciantar, the lout who ran over two twins and ignored a shamefully reduced driving ban, is walking around freely and aiming kicks at journalists.

The point has been made before about discrepancies in sentencing, and week by week the opportunity presents itself to highlight the situation again. It is just not making sense to the people it should be making sense to. Those who make the laws and those who apply them must become more conscious of this. It is not a case of pandering to the masses, but proceeding in a manner the public can relate to.

However, the inconsistencies do not stop there. While cannabis is wrongly given heroin status in this country when the worldwide trend is to do the precise opposite, cigarettes hold a dignified position in our society simply because we are used to living with tobacco and it is legal to sell them.

There is no denying that cannabis, especially if used heavily, can cause harm particularly of a psychological nature. But smoking kills, not just the people who are doing the smoking but also those around them. The first global study into the effects of passive smoking estimated that it causes 600,000 deaths a year. One-third of these are children.

To its credit, Malta was one of the first countries worldwide which attempted to do something about this problem, by banning – in the face of opposition from businessmen who held nothing but their self-interest to heart – smoking in restaurants, bars and indoor public areas.

It would be a gross exaggeration to say there has not been a beneficial effect for people who frequent many public places and restaurants, as they no longer have to struggle to draw breath or wash their smoke-impregnated clothes when they arrive home.

However, the law that made sense when it was introduced has gone wrong. The findings of a medical study we are publishing today (see page 1) reveal that although the smoking bans have led to a decrease in the heart disease death rate and hospital admissions in every country where they have been introduced, there has been no such improvement in Malta.

Cardiologist Robert Xuereb has said he is “shocked and disappointed” by the results. Yet he reiterated a fact that we are all aware of: that though Malta has legislation on smoking which is not being enforced – particularly in bars, band clubs and places of entertainment.

An exercise carried out by this newspaper last year revealed how the ban was being ignored with impunity by many establishments in Paceville, though the problem exists in several other places. Nothing has changed and yet the government has still announced plans to ban smoking in all public areas from 2013.

One of the most disturbing consequences of the refusal by the authorities – it cannot be termed as anything else – to enforce a law they themselves enacted is that it is mainly young people who are bearing the brunt. They will be the ones walking into hospital with heart and respiratory problems in future.

There is a strong argument to suggest that this is a much more culpable act than an Englishman who grows cannabis plants in his home. Yet either through inertia, negligence or convenience – in the form of pandering to business interests – the authorities refuse to see it. Unfortunately, however, no one will sentence them to 10 years in jail.