Cornerstones of the Swedish tobacco policy
Smoke-free restaurants, pubs and cafés
In May 2004 the Riksdag accepted the government bill on smoke-free eating and drinking establishments. This means that from 1 June 2005 all pubs, restaurants and cafés in Sweden are smoke-free.
Support to people wishing to stop smoking
The Government's objective in undertaking tobacco prevention efforts is to reduce tobacco-related disease and mortality. The fact that health and medical care is becoming better at treating and curing tobacco-related diseases is important, but not sufficient to achieve this objective. Moreover, it is more expensive for society to wait until tobacco-related diseases have broken out - an event that usually brings enormous personal suffering to those affected.
Smoke-free public premises
For many years, the only public premises in which smoking was still allowed were cafés, restaurants, bars and similar places serving food and drinks. Other public premises were already smoke-free.
Legislation, taxes and other instruments
We can reduce the harmful effects of tobacco by using various policy instruments and implementing various initiatives to reduce tobacco consumption.These include legislation, information and economic policy measures.
The WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control
A global convention on tobacco control was signed on 28 May 2003. It was adopted in May 2003 by the World Health Assembly, the decision-making body of the World Health Organisation. The Convention is to limit tobacco consumption and the growing ill-health caused by tobacco.
