AMMAN - The Ministry of Health is working to help government institutions implement the smoking ban by providing advice and logistics, a ministry official said on Sunday.
Malek Habashneh, director of the ministry's awareness department, said authorities are working to assist institutions in developing guidelines to implement the ban as stipulated in the Public Health Law.
"We have visited 30 institutions, evaluated their needs and developed mechanisms based on the findings," he told The Jordan Times yesterday.
The move comes as part of the ministry's "Influencing Decision Makers" project, which was launched last month to encourage civil servants to play a more active role in upholding the ban, he said.
Meanwhile, the ministry announced that it has issued warnings to eight hotels for failing to implement the ban, since the beginning of the year.
"We agreed with hotels to allocate rooms and halls for smokers to gradually implement the law," Habashneh said, adding that the gradual implementation of the law is expected to take two years.
Smoking in hotels will not be banned completely, he said, noting that the ministry has accommodated establishments by allowing them to maintain designated smoking rooms.
The Public Heath Law was enforced in the Kingdom's shopping malls and Queen Alia International Airport in March 2009 and in fast-food restaurants in June of the same year. A Cabinet decision prohibiting smoking in ministries and public institutions went into force on May 25, 2010.
According to the law, smoking is prohibited in public places which include hospitals, healthcare centres, schools, cinemas, theatres, libraries, museums, public and non-governmental buildings, public transport vehicles, airports, closed playgrounds, lecture halls and any other location to be determined by the health minister.
Any person caught smoking in a public place is subject to between one week and one month imprisonment or a JD15-JD25 fine. The same penalties apply to those who sell cigarettes to minors.
Hundreds of violators of the law were referred to court or issued warnings last year, Habashneh said in a lecture at Al Rai Centre for Strategic Studies last week
He noted that 229 violators were referred to court and 520 received warnings since May 2010.
© Jordan Times 2011
