PHUKET: A bar at Phuket International Airport has been allowed to breach smoking laws, the airport's General Manager, Prathuang Somkhom, confirmed today.
The decision to allow smoking had been made by the bar's operators, he said. Airports of Thailand owns the Phuket airport facility and leases space to businesses.
Phuket International Airport also has smokers' rooms in both the international and domestic departure lounges.
Thailand's Public Health Ministry is likely to crack down on illegal smoking after a call yesterday for all of Thailand's international airports to ban smoking entirely.
Ironically, the call comes as Thailand becomes extremely popular with tourists from China, a country where smoking has yet to be treated with social disdain and laws enacted to minimise it.
Phuket-region resort managers and Andaman national park rangers are having to deal with more cigarette butts and more smoky rooms, byproducts of the Chinese influx.
Thailand laws ban smoking at airports but this is only enforced at domestic airports, not international ones. Even smokers these days frequently agree with tightening bans on smoking.
''Some resorts use ozone-cleaning machines,'' Bhuritt Maswongsa, Vice President of the Phuket Tourism Association, said today.
''Others have a mix of smoking and no smoking. Some resorts ban smoking altogether.''
A growing number of five-star resorts on Phuket have a no-tolerance policy. If a housekeeper sniffs smoke in a room, the occupant is likely to be warned and perhaps even fined.
A second breach could even lead to their premature departure, one resort manager said today.
Mahidol University public health researcher Associate Professor Dr Niphan Kungskulniti said her team found that smoking rooms, areas near smoking rooms and non-smoking areas at Phuket and three other international airports in Thailand had high second-hand smoke levels with small particles under 2.5 micrograms exceeding World Health Organisation standards.
With more addicts from China flying to Phuket, perhaps a Phuket holiday is the perfect place to break with the addiction?
Certainly, if passengers are able to survive a long flight without a single puff, then those who wish to break the habit are off to a flying start, literally.
Phuketwan was unable to contact the owner of the bar at Phuket International Airport but has been told the Bill Bentley Pub is operated by a different owner to the Bill Bentley Pub further north, in a Mai Khao shopping centre.
The decision to allow smoking had been made by the bar's operators, he said. Airports of Thailand owns the Phuket airport facility and leases space to businesses.
Phuket International Airport also has smokers' rooms in both the international and domestic departure lounges.
Thailand's Public Health Ministry is likely to crack down on illegal smoking after a call yesterday for all of Thailand's international airports to ban smoking entirely.
Ironically, the call comes as Thailand becomes extremely popular with tourists from China, a country where smoking has yet to be treated with social disdain and laws enacted to minimise it.
Phuket-region resort managers and Andaman national park rangers are having to deal with more cigarette butts and more smoky rooms, byproducts of the Chinese influx.
Thailand laws ban smoking at airports but this is only enforced at domestic airports, not international ones. Even smokers these days frequently agree with tightening bans on smoking.
''Some resorts use ozone-cleaning machines,'' Bhuritt Maswongsa, Vice President of the Phuket Tourism Association, said today.
''Others have a mix of smoking and no smoking. Some resorts ban smoking altogether.''
A growing number of five-star resorts on Phuket have a no-tolerance policy. If a housekeeper sniffs smoke in a room, the occupant is likely to be warned and perhaps even fined.
A second breach could even lead to their premature departure, one resort manager said today.
Mahidol University public health researcher Associate Professor Dr Niphan Kungskulniti said her team found that smoking rooms, areas near smoking rooms and non-smoking areas at Phuket and three other international airports in Thailand had high second-hand smoke levels with small particles under 2.5 micrograms exceeding World Health Organisation standards.
With more addicts from China flying to Phuket, perhaps a Phuket holiday is the perfect place to break with the addiction?
Certainly, if passengers are able to survive a long flight without a single puff, then those who wish to break the habit are off to a flying start, literally.
Phuketwan was unable to contact the owner of the bar at Phuket International Airport but has been told the Bill Bentley Pub is operated by a different owner to the Bill Bentley Pub further north, in a Mai Khao shopping centre.
Are you fighting smoke or are you fighting smokers?! Shame on you all. Today they up there make enemies out of smokers. Tomorrow they'll ban fast food. Then something else will be declared hazardous and zero-tolerated - just to keep us divided, to rule us.
Posted by Mike on May 8, 2013 19:14