The origins of tobacco are somewhat shrouded in history, but some sources suggest that the tobacco plant was growing in the Americas at least some 8,000 years ago and that 6,000 years later American inhabitants had begun finding ways to use tobacco, including chewing, smoking, and in hallucinogenic enemas! A pottery vessel found in Guatemala dating from before the 11th century shows the first pictorial evidence of smoking and depicts a Mayan inhaling smoke from a roll of tobacco leaves tied with string. Concerns about the dangers of passive smoking have led to growing pressures to restrict or prohibit smoking in public places. Such places are typically defined in this context as any enclosed or semi-enclosed area that members of the public have access to which provides a business or service, including workplaces, buildings, and public transport.( Adams, Walter (2004))
Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), the anti-smoking pressure group, identifies London Transport's banning of smoking on single-deck buses and its increase in the proportion of underground trains reserved for non-smokers from 50 per cent to 75 per cent in 1971 as a key date in the move towards smoke-free public places. Since then a growing number of private, public, and voluntary sector organisations have banned smoking on their premises. This ban includes many cinemas, most forms of public transport, some railway stations, many airlines, a number of banks, a growing number of workplaces, many hospital premises and their grounds, and also parts of football stadium. By 2003 a growing number of local and regional authorities within the UK began to openly promote the introduction of a complete ban on smoking in public places. In January 2003 the Welsh Assembly voted in favour of an all-party motion calling on the UK Government to bring forward a Bill giving the Assembly powers to ban smoking in all public places.................
