France bans smoking in public places.
 

The ban is in public places for now.
The ban in restaurants will go into effect in 11 months.

Good for France!

I tried to post the above 3 times, without success. Now I tried again, without the two urls, and it worked. apparently posting a url causes some problem?! I will try to post the urls in post #3 of this thread.

Here are two news articles:
http://www.lemonde.fr/web/article/0,...-860588,0.html

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/worl...f=slogin%C2%A0

It worked, obviously. I guess we can't START a thread to post an article or other url link. Interesting....

Good! Now if they would just build some more fast food joints, pass a law requiring everyone to speak English and start invading some Middle Eastern countries willy-nilly it won't be a half bad place for an American to visit. (That was sarcasm, by the way).

This is pretty old news, isn't it? It seems I've been hearing about it for months.

People start threads with posts including URLs on Fodors all the time, it must have been a random time when something doesn't post. I've had that happen, I think when things are busy.

I don't understand your post, SDA. How does banning smoking fit in with the "Americanization" of France?

Are you saying that France shouldn't reduce a dangerous practice like smoking because it might interfer with an American's fantasy of what France should be? Isn't that a little selfish?

SDA is obviously a smoker. ;)

Or someone with a sense of humor.

I loved the ssigns we saw in various cafes nad bars..où est ma liberté ?

No, it shouldn't be "old news," since it just went into effect Thursday, February 1.

aghh, another country bites it.

So what's a public place? Does this impact bars and cafes? Will smoking be banned in restaurants outright -- or will a non-smoking section just be mandatory now? (wishful thinking, i know)

Fishee, see the two articles for answers to some of your questions.

Fishee, the non-smoking sections have been mandatory since 1992 (I know, it didn't show, but that's France! ). And of course the current law concerns all public spaces BUT restaurants, cafés and casinos. This of course bears no relation whatsoever with the fact that presidential and parliamentary elections are due this spring and that restaurateurs and café managers are one of the right's traditional constituencies. As a matter of fact, restaurants, cafés and discos can wait until Jan 08 to apply the law. Après moi, le déluge!