More Canadian university and college campuses going smoke-free: report

TORONTO – A Canadian Cancer Society report says 65 university and college campuses across Canada are now fully smoke-free both indoors and out.

The report says the number has more than doubled since last year, when 30 campuses were smoke-free. That’s a dramatic rise from a decade earlier, when only four post-secondary institutions had full smoking bans.

Dalhousie University in Halifax was among the first to make its campus 100 per cent smoke-free in 2003. Those that have followed include the University of Regina, McMaster University in Hamilton and George Brown College in Toronto.

Of the universities and colleges that are smoke-free, many have policies that also apply to cannabis, hookah smoking and e-cigarettes.

The report says many other institutions are in the process of developing strengthened policies in view of next month’s legalization of recreational cannabis.

Rob Cunningham, senior policy analyst at the Canadian Cancer Society, says there are about 260 universities and colleges in Canada, so there is still much work to be done to make all campuses smoke-free.

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