Osaka bans smoking on all of its streets, vaping included

The cultural shift against smoking cigarettes over the last 2 decades has been fun to watch. Ironically, at the same time there has been an acceptance of smoking weed. You get dirtier looks and more likely to be harassed smoking a cigarette than you would smoking weed, regardless of place and time of day.<p>Not that one is better than the other per-se. But I just find it baffling how acceptable it is to see someone publicly smoking weed at 7am on a weekday. What does this guy&#x27;s day look like? How can he function high all day? At least bottomless brunch is reserved for the weekend.

Here, &quot;vaping&quot; is a mistranslation. The law actually refers to 加熱式たばこ, or &quot;heated tobacco products&quot; (HTP), which contain tobacco leaf just like regular cigarettes, but don&#x27;t combust. On the other hand, nicotine vapes are classified as medical devices and have never been approved for sale, but technically individuals can import them. The evidence for HTPs being healthier than cigarettes is thin. I believe that overregulation of nicotine vapes is a form of protectionism for Japan Tobacco, which the Government of Japan owns a large stake in. This is a clear conflict of interest.

It was really amazing to see how little smoking is visible in Tokyo and Osaka these days, even taking vaping into account. I don&#x27;t know what the smoking&#x2F;vaping rates are, but it&#x27;s increasingly confined to homes or small smoking areas which makes things much nicer if you&#x27;re a non-smoker.<p>The fine is small, but I think in Japan the shame is probably the real punishment - 1000 yen might buy you two beers in a bar.

I&#x27;m gonna ask the same thing I asked when some city in Spain did this.<p>What happens to people who live in non smoking apartments and don&#x27;t have private outdoor space to smoke?<p>I&#x27;m not sure what a &quot;reasonable&quot; carve out for these people would look like but people aren&#x27;t idiots and they tend to resent individuals, groups and institutions that make their daily behavior unlawful with the stroke of a pen and the more policy subjects on which you do that the more resentment you build and eventually it starts road blocking other actions. Doing things that way is not what sustainable government looks like.<p>(edit: Disclaimer before anyone jumps down my throat, obviously the political realities of public policy and compliance are different in Japan than in the west.)

Twice last year, I went into a coffee shop in Osaka to kill some time and the shop turned out to allow smoking, so I left. I was surprised both times, as that hasn’t happened to me in Yokohama (where I live) or Tokyo for a long time.<p>One of the shops [1] was in Taisho Ward, and the other [2] was in the basement of one of the Osaka Eki-mae buildings—both places with a working-class, nontrendy atmosphere.<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;tabelog.com&#x2F;osaka&#x2F;A2701&#x2F;A270401&#x2F;27077305&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;tabelog.com&#x2F;osaka&#x2F;A2701&#x2F;A270401&#x2F;27077305&#x2F;</a><p>[2] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;tabelog.com&#x2F;osaka&#x2F;A2701&#x2F;A270101&#x2F;27060170&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;tabelog.com&#x2F;osaka&#x2F;A2701&#x2F;A270101&#x2F;27060170&#x2F;</a>

Japan is already pretty deep into the smokefree thing. Crazy proof about how adaptive the Japan team is

Fire department disbanded

Coming up next and already happening: Alcohol is phased out.

cool now do something about car exhaust.

Now we need every city to do this.