Minors and cigarettes
Minors and cigarettes
Apart from the federal law on passive smoking which, since 1 May 2010, has prohibited smoking in areas open to the public, particularly in restaurants, tobacco policy is still largely a matter for the cantons. As the website of the Federal Office of Public Health points out, the cantons implement the federal provisions, but they also draw up their own legislation. They enact the laws to be applied on their territory to ensure the protection of the population and to limit the advertising and sale of tobacco products. There is therefore great diversity from one canton to another in the regulation of tobacco products and the age at which they may be purchased. Some cantons set the age limit at 18, while others set it at 16. In Geneva and the canton of Vaud, you have to be 18 to be able to legally buy cigarettes. However, Geneva's criminal law prohibits minors from smoking, but only up to the age of 16. In the canton of Vaud, it is the law on compulsory education that prohibits pupils from smoking, but the scope of this law only applies up to secondary school, which normally ends around the age of 16. At the other end of the lake, any offender risks a fine, and parents, legal guardians or persons with de facto custody of a minor are liable to a criminal penalty if they fail to prevent him or her from smoking. It is generally recognised that teachers have de facto custody of the pupils in their care. In other words, pupils in Geneva and Vaud secondary schools are not supposed to smoke, but they are free to do so when they start secondary school in the city of Calvin and the surrounding area, or gymnasium beyond the Versoix.2023 will see the entry into force of a new federal law on tobacco products and electronic cigarettes, which by definition will apply to all cantons. Its aim is to protect the population from the harmful effects of tobacco consumption and the use of electronic cigarettes. One of its strong points is that it will standardise, throughout Switzerland, the ban on the sale of such products to young people under the age of 18, a preventive measure of this kind that is now internationally recognised. Anyone found in breach of the ban will be liable to a fine of up to CHF 40,000.
