Hanoi deploys smoke-free environment for tourism

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The Hanoi Municipal People's Committee on May 26 announced that the city will host a chain of activities in response to the World No Tobacco Day (May 31), following the theme "tobacco and lung diseases".

Accordingly, local authorities and travel companies will work together to build non-smoking tourist destinations, restaurants and hotels in Hanoi.

Deputy Minister of Health Nguyen Viet Tien cited the fact that 96.8 percent of lung cancer patients in Vietnam smoke. Passive smoking is also the cause of lung diseases in children, making them suffer from health problems in adulthood, he said.

Luong Ngoc Khue, Head of the Health Ministry’s Department of Medical Examination and Treatment said smoking bans have been instituted in 1,560 State administrative agencies, 10,000 schools, 4,442 factories, and 508 hospitals.

Nearly 70 percent of trade unions at the grassroots level say no to smoking at the working environment while 195,000 workers gave up smoking.

Hanoi’s tourism sector has directly contributed 4.15 percent and indirectly contributed 10.12 percent to the city’s GDP. In 2019, Hanoi aims to lure more than 28.9 million tourists, up 10.1 percent over 2018, including over 7 million foreign visitors, up 17 percent. Tourism revenue in the year is expected to rise 34 percent to 103.8 trillion VND (4.46 billion USD).