A few years ago, on a trip to Italy, we were amazed to see signs going up in bars and restaurants proclaiming vietato fumare—”smoking prohibited.”

Italy! Of all countries, Italy seemed the least likely to ban cigarettes. Indeed, the first time we noticed no smoking sign prominently displayed behind a bar, a bartender lounged beside it happily puffing away. At the time, we figured the Italian government would content itself with posting signs, and Italians would content themselves with ignoring them.

We were wrong. At the beginning of January, 2005, Italy banned smoking in all cafes, bars, restaurants and discotheques. And the ban is working. Italy wasn’t the first European country to go smoke-free. That distinction belongs to Ireland, which became the first country to ban smoking in indoor workplaces, including restaurants and bars. Well before then, California had become the first U.S. state to declare all bars and restaurants smoke free.

A lot of people said it couldn’t be done. Restaurant owners wrung their hands over lost business. Bartenders warned that there could be physical violence if smokers were ejected.

It didn’t happen. The bans have taken effect with remarkable ease in most places.

More will follow. According to research in the New England Journal of Medicine, indoor smoking bans have been credited with an average 3.8 percent decline in the prevalence of smoking. There’s already evidence that respiratory health is improving where the bans have taken effect. Experts believe that smoke-free bars and restaurants help smokers quit, since they do away with the smoky establishments that made many would-be quitters relapse.

As the authors of the NEJM report declare, “In short, the world has begun to reclaim clean air as the social norm.”

That’s cause for celebration.

Tags: cigarettes, respiratory health, smoking, smoking bans, smoking cessation