The New Brunswick government has joined Nova Scotia in adding marijuana to its Smoke-free Places Act. The same rules will apply as they currently do for tobacco or e-cigarette users.
If marijuana becomes legalized in New Brunswick, people won't be able to light up wherever they want.
"Any substance that is smoked and that creates smoke, second-hand smoke, would be banned in the same places that cigarettes are banned today," says New Brunswick Health Minister Victor Boudreau.
Smoking of any substance is not allowed near or on patios, or within three metres of patios, and within nine metres of doorways or windows of public or work places. Smoking is also not allowed within 20 metres of children's play areas.
"The Smoke-free Places Act, during the last session, we brought in restrictions around e-cigarettes, and making it so that wherever you couldn't smoke a regular cigarette you couldn't smoke an e-cigarette,” says Boudreau. “Now, with this amendment today, we're including all forms of smoke."
New Brunswick is not the first province to make this amendment; Nova Scotia and Quebec have also made steps to include all types of smoking in their smoke-free acts.
Another addition made by the government on Thursday is that no smoking is allowed in and around all hospitals.
"I’m so proud to be a New Brunswicker to be able to see this come to fruition,” says health advocate Kerrie Luck. "It’s a good thing in terms of being very proactive and looking how, in the future, how we don't want to get into another situation where we've worked so hard to minimize and reduce the exposure to second-hand smoke in our province."
Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island have already prohibited smoking on all hospital grounds.
With files from CTV Atlantic’s Laura Brown
