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James Reilly launches the plain packaging plan earlier this year Photocall Ireland

Reilly working towards 'smoke-free' Ireland by 2025

The Health Minister’s vowing to continue his war on smoking – and says cigarettes are the only freely available product he knows of that can kill the user.

THE GOVERNMENT IS considering a plans which will significantly reduce the number of smokers within the next 12 years. The plan, based on a document called ‘Tobacco-Free Ireland’ aims to reduce the proportion of the population who smoke to just 5 per cent.

Health Minister James Reilly says he’s hoping to make the country entirely smoke free, and is working on a number of measures to achieve that aim.

He told the Oireachtas Health Committee yesterday that he was looking at extending the existing smoking ban to cover public spaces like beaches and parks, adding that further efforts would also be made to increase “educational awareness” and bring in more cessation services. He told the committee:

It is the only product I know of that is legally and freely available that will kill you, according to the manufacturers’ instructions.

The Government has already agreed plans to remove branding from cigarette packs – with legislation expected next year, and Reilly says that’s one way the coalition is working to “denormalise” the habit.

Speaking at the launch of the initiative on plain packaging back in May, Reilly revealed that he had lost his brother and his father to smoking-related diseases.

Menthol cigarettes may be also be banned throughout the European Union from 2017, after EU health ministers agreed to a new directive on tabacco sales at a meeting last month – chaired by Reilly as part of Ireland’s EU presidency.

The minister’s plans have come in for criticism today from pro-smoking group Forest Éireann, which receives much of its finding from the tobacco industry. According to spokesman, John Mallon:

James Reilly is on a personal crusade that could do enormous harm to Ireland’s status as a free, consumer-led, society.

He should remember that tobacco is a legal product enjoyed by many adults who have no intention of quitting. If anything, they are reaching for their fags in defiance.

Research has shown that over 5,200 people die every year from tobacco related diseases and that one in every two smokers will die from their addiction.

Read: Plain pack cigarettes will ‘save lives’ and prevent child smokers >

Read: James Reilly channels Arnold Schwarzenegger in battle against cigarettes >

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    Mute Mick Rooney (TIPM)
    Favourite Mick Rooney (TIPM)
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    Jul 16th 2016, 7:14 PM

    There was never anything to indicate this was terrorism related. Unfortunately the media will look for a terrorism link if someone falls off their bicycle. Smoke alerts in the avionics bay and lavatory, and no decompression alerts all indicate a fire, not a blast.

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    Mute Peter Fechter
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    Jul 16th 2016, 7:00 PM

    So ISIS never claimed this disaster….

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    Mute Nick Allen
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    Jul 16th 2016, 8:52 PM

    Peter

    What are you trying to say? IS never claimed responsibility although a lot of thejournal posters did say it

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    Mute Peter Fechter
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    Jul 16th 2016, 9:11 PM

    Nick..i was trying to emphasise the perfidy of ISIS and their claims of responsibility….to wit….yesterdays speculation around the truck atrocity.

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    Mute Jim Meen.
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    Jul 16th 2016, 11:57 PM

    Accident or not, I’m glad I’m only going to Wexford for my holidays this year. This shiite is is happening way too much.

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    Mute Fluffer TheCanary
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    Jul 17th 2016, 12:46 AM

    just don’t end up in the stores, or you’ll wish you were on the plane

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    Mute Tony Comerford
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    Jul 17th 2016, 7:26 AM

    2016. We can communicate with a satellite orbiting Saturn and a robot on Mars. Yet, after weeks of deep sea searching with all the all the associated costs and agony of uncertainty for families, we can determine that the word ‘fire’ was heard on the flight recorder. Surely there must be more investment made in facilitating live transmissions of cockpit data.

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    Mute Chlorines72
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    Jul 16th 2016, 8:28 PM

    I bet Israel were pretty p**sed off with the telemetry report rfelease. Big slip up there and no ISIS to blame!

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    Mute David Ryan
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    Jul 16th 2016, 10:06 PM

    Fckin yawn fest. Planes sometimes crash on their own behalf.

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