After recommendations to all of Ohio's public institutions of higher education to establish tobacco-free campuses, the Northeast Ohio Medical University (NEOMED) has done exactly that.

Heather Bing is a PR and marketing specialist with NEOMED, and she tells AkronNewsNow that as of November the campus will be completely tobacco free.

"Now we're working to let people know that it is going into effect and it will be taking place November first. That's a matter of communicating to employees, students and then to our visitors that are coming to campus" says Bing.  

Bing continued to say, "I think the most important thing were trying to get across is that we did take the recommendation of the Ohio Board of Regents very seriously and that we're always striving to improve the health of the region through education, through service, through different research and so I think it's really important that we're also living that measure."

With the new policy, NEOMED is also making sure smoking cessation programs are available at very little to no cost. 

Bing explains, "We're also putting in place a number of different smoking cessation programs things that we already had in place we want to make sure those are available to them often times at reduced to no cost so we do want to make sure we're helping them through the transition."