With Japan still reluctant to ban smoking in restaurants and bars outright, a cancer researcher has launched a website to make it easier to find those few establishments that have declared themselves smoke-free — and encourage other such businesses to take the same step.
The site, which is called Quemlin and is published in Japanese, enables users to search for smoke-free restaurants, cafes and bars by type of cuisine and location. It introduces each establishment and also features information about how their nonsmoking policies have positively impacted their business.
Yuri Ito, 40, chief researcher at the Osaka International Cancer Institute, likes to dine out and has been posting photos on her Facebook page of nonsmoking establishments she has visited since 2015. But what inspired her to launch the search site for smoke-free restaurants and bars was the fact that many such venues had maintained their popularity after going smoke-free.