During the past several decades, social awareness of the damaging health effects of smoking has greatly increased.

At the same time, more and more local, state and national governments across the world are implementing tobacco bans in restaurants and other areas while taxes on tobacco products continue to increase.

Even in Spain, which is stereotyped by many as a nation of chain smokers, a growing number of restrictions on tobacco use is being implemented.

As a result, the number of smokers worldwide continues to fall. It is therefore unsurprising that Creighton University decided to completely ban tobacco products across campus last year.

However, the ban is too radical to have short-term success.

As mentioned before, the number of smokers, not the least in the United States, is rapidly declining worldwide. It is therefore plausible that in a few generations, if not sooner, tobacco use will become a marginal and socially unacceptable activity.

However, this will not happen overnight. A visible proportion of Creighton students continues to smoke despite the ban.

Whether they go to smoke across the street or sneak a cigarette when nobody is watching, tobacco use prevails on campus.

While I agree with the authors of the tobacco ban that smoking is a harmful activity that should be relegated to the margins of public life, such a radical ban has not proved to be successful.

Future prospective freshmen will make their decisions regarding on-campus living within the context of the tobacco ban.

It is naive to expect current students who smoke to quit smoking, transfer to another college or make an effort to go off campus to feed their addictions.

However, it is positive that smokers are not being fined this year and that Campus Safety will for the time being pursue a policy of education.

Yet a much more effective strategy would have been to establish several designated areas for smokers in areas of campus that those concerned about second-hand smoke could easily avoid.

The university could decrease the number of these areas over time, making Creighton entirely tobacco-free within a longer period of time.

In order to be effective, drastic changes on campus such as the complete banning of tobacco products need to be implemented gradually over the span of time.

It is positive that social awareness of the dangers of tobacco use is increasing and that steps are being taken to prevent tobacco use.

A radical policy that seeks to completely and immediately outlaw smoking at a campus where hundreds of students do so is unrealistic and unlikely to succeed.

A more moderate, gradual approach aimed at marginalizing tobacco use, rather than attempting to eradicate it, seems like a better solution.