A man installs a heater on a Paris cafe terrace where people can smoke, 08 January 2008, after cafes, restau-rants and nightclubs across France became smoke-free as of 01 January when a nationwide ban on smoking went into effect. Under France's anti-tobacco legisla-tion, some 15 million smokers in France who light up in cafes face fines of between 68 Euros (100 dollars) and 450 Euros while business owners can incur penal-ties of up to 750 Euros for violations.

圖中這位男士今年1月8日正在巴黎一家露天咖啡座架設室外暖氣爐，法國今年元旦開始全面禁菸令生效後，所有咖啡屋、餐廳和夜店再也不會「烏煙瘴氣」，只有像圖中這種露天咖啡座還開放抽菸。根據法國反菸法，全國1500萬癮君子如果在咖啡屋吞雲吐霧，將面臨68歐元（100美元）到450歐元的罰鍰，企業主也因觸犯法令規定最高可處750歐元罰款。

For years, anyone needing a nicotine fix in a French cafe didn't even have to light up -- the air was already so full of smoke that they only had to open their mouth and inhale. But that all changes on Jan. 1 when strict new bans take effect. There was long and fierce resistance to the prohibitions on tobacco that other countries imposed.

多年來，任何人上法國咖啡館，一旦菸癮發作，甚至連菸都不用點，因為空氣中已經「菸」霧迷漫，只要張大嘴巴用力吸就行了。但隨著嚴格的新禁菸令於元旦生效後，這一切都改變了。其他國家早就禁菸，但在法國則遭遇長期頑抗。

With the ban, France joined the ranks of European countries that have enacted anti-smoking restrictions. Most recently, anti-smoking laws took effect New Year's Day in eight states in neighboring Germany, in-cluding Berlin and Bavaria.

這次禁菸令後，法國躋身歐洲已實施反菸限制的國家之林。最近，同樣在新年元旦，鄰近的德國八個邦，包括柏林和巴伐利亞也實施禁菸令。

Some called it the end of an era in a nation that long portrayed the cigarette as a sign of freedom, rebellion, individualism or even intellect. Personalities who marked contemporary France, like the author Albert Camus or the thinkers Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir, smoked their cigarettes and pipes in the warm interior of Les Deux Magots, once a gathering place for the nation's literati.

對一個長久以來一直奉香菸為自由、叛逆、個人主義或甚至知識分子表徵的國家，有人說這不啻代表一個紀元的結束。法國當代重量級人物，像作家卡謬或思想家沙特及西蒙波娃都曾在法國人文薈萃的溫暖的左岸雙叟咖啡屋抽香菸或菸斗。

According to statistics from Eurostat, every third man and every fifth woman smokes in France. Every year 66,000 people die from tobacco consumption and up to 5,000 people die as a result of passive smoking.

歐盟統計局的統計數字顯示，法國每三個男人和每五個女人就有一人抽菸，每年有66,000人因抽菸死亡，同時至少有5000人死於二手煙。