Fears as smoking ban results reversed

THE decline in smoking since the workplace ban was introduced in 2004 has now been reversed, the Irish Cancer Society (ICS) claimed yesterday.

The society is particularly alarmed at the growing number of young women and teenagers who are taking up smoking.

There has been a reversal in the decline in smoking among teenagers with around one-in-five of 15 to 18-year-olds now smoking cigarettes. Almost one-in-four of the population smoke.