DUBLIN, Sept 28, 2007 (AFP) - Ireland's smoking ban has not just improved the air quality in its famous pubs, but has also boosted the quality of music sessions for drinkers, doctors reported Friday.

Specifically it has helped musicians clean up their traditional instruments, clogged up with years of dirt in smoke-filled pubs, so they can produce clearer sounds in fug-free bars.

The pub session, where musicians gather to play traditional music together, is commonplace throughout bars in Ireland where they play a central role in social life.

CAPE TOWN, Sept 20, 2007 (AFP) - South African lawmakers gave their final seal of approval Thursday to legislation which will make it harder for smokers to indulge their habit in the open air, at home or in their cars.

The amendment bill makes it an offence to smoke within a prescribed distance from a window, ventilation inlet, doorway or entrance to a public place -- and introduces a fine of 500 rand (about 70 dollars) for breaches.

PARIS, Sept 4, 2007 (AFP) - Three in four French people plan to eat out just as much after a nationwide ban on smoking in restaurants comes into force on January 1, with a fifth planning to indulge more often, a poll said Tuesday.

According to the national health education institute INPES, 72 percent of respondents -- smokers and non-smokers alike -- did not expect to change their dining habits, while 19 percent planned to frequent restaurants more often.

PARIS, Aug 31, 2007 (AFP) - Chronic bronchitis and emphysema caused by passive smoking are set to kill nearly two million people in China who today are aged over 50, according to a study published Friday.

That toll more than doubles if one include deaths from lung cancer and heart disease also inflicted by second-hand tobacco, one of the authors told AFP.

BEIJING, Aug 28, 2007 (AFP) - China intends to ban all tobacco advertising by the beginning of 2011, the latest possible date required under an international treaty, state press reported Tuesday.

The end of the advertising will be in line with China's commitments to a World Health Organisation convention, Xinhua news agency said, citing Jiang Yuan from the health ministry-affiliated State Tobacco Control Office.

SYDNEY, Aug 8, 2007 (AFP) - Australian researchers Wednesday said they had developed a world-first treatment which could save hundreds of thousands of smokers and diabetics from undergoing leg amputations.

The procedure involves pumping blood at high pressure into limbs dying of vascular disease to stimulate the growth of new blood vessels, the researchers said, and has saved the leg of the first patient to be treated.

LONDON, Aug 2, 2007 (AFP) - A pub landlord said Thursday his plot to get round England's smoking ban by selling nicotine gum and lozenges had caught fire with customers.

Chris Llewelyn, 49, the landlord at the Cobblestones Inn near Bridgwater, southwest England, came up with the brainwave after smokers grumbled about having to go outside in the miserable weather for a nicotine hit.

England's ban on smoking in enclosed public spaces was introduced on July 1, bringing it into line with the rest of the United Kingdom.

LOS ANGELES, July 26, 2007 (AFP) - Disney says it will ban cigarettes in its family films and discourage depictions of people smoking in other movies.

The Walt Disney Company made the unprecedented pledge in a letter to a US lawmaker, Representative Edward Markey, who recently held hearings on the impact of film images on children.

LOS ANGELES, July 25, 2007 (AFP) - Disney says that in upcoming films under its brand it will discourage depictions of people smoking, in a letter sent to a US lawmaker released Wednesday.

'The Walt Disney Company today made a commitment to US Representative Edward Markey, chairman of the House Telecommunications and the Internet Subcommittee, that it will discourage depictions of cigarette smoking in its films and will place an anti-smoking PSA (public service announcement) on DVDs of any future film that does depict smoking,' the statement said.

SEOUL, July 24, 2007 (AFP) - North Korea has imposed a smoking ban at all venues used by its leader Kim Jong-Il after doctors advised him to stop smoking and drinking, a former South Korean lawmaker said Tuesday.

The doctors urged Kim to quit after he underwent a heart operation, said Jang Sung-Min, an associate of former South Korean president Kim Dae-Jung who held a historic summit with Kim Jong-Il in 2000.