SASKATOON – The professional association for doctors working in Saskatchewan is calling for changes to the province’s tobacco regulations. During the biannual meeting of the Saskatchewan Medical Association’s (SMA) representative assembly, members unanimously passed three anti-smoking resolutions.
The group calls on government to ban “smoking of all tobacco products, including shisha and hookah, in all indoor and outdoor public places such as patios of restaurants and bars, hospital grounds, sports fields, playgrounds and outdoor stadiums.”
READ MORE: Saskatoon city council bans smoking at outdoor city properties
The City of Saskatoon passed a similar bylaw in late-October, preventing people from smoking in outdoor, city-owned locations.
The 90-member assembly also wants e-cigarettes to be regulated like traditional tobacco. The other resolution urges government to ban flavoured tobacco, including menthol cigarettes.
“What we saw in the last 12 years, since smoking was banned in indoor public places, is we saw that the smoking rates in Saskatchewan have dropped from about 25 per cent to about 20 per cent,” said SMA president Dr. Mark Brown.
In a statement to Global News, Saskatchewan Health Minister Dustin Duncan said the province will continue to allow municipalities to make their own decisions regarding public smoking outdoors.
The impact of flavoured tobacco measures in other provinces will continue to be “monitored” by the Government of Saskatchewan, he added.
As for e-cigarettes, Duncan said the provincial government will continue to watch the approach Health Canada takes on the issue, including the results of a report from the federal standing committee on health, submitted earlier this year.
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