Smokers have become less dependent but also less motivated to stop

The study, published in the scientific journal Addiction, analaysed data from 41,610 smokers in England.

The findings show smokers consume fewer cigarettes per day (an average of 10.9 in 2017 compared with 13.6 in 2008) and fewer of them smoke within an hour of waking up each day. The proportion who do not smoke every day has gone up from 9.1% to 13.4%. This goes against a popularly held view that as smoking prevalence has gone down, the remaining smokers are more dependent. The proportion of smokers who tried to stop smoking in the past year has declined from 37.0% to 29.9%.

Researchers also found that the proportion smoking roll-your-own cigarettes has increased from 35.3% to 50.7% and the proportion who are trying to cut down how much they smoke has declined from 56.1% to 47.9%.

The proportion of smokers who are in low paid and manual occupational groups does not appear to have gone up suggesting that England’s approach to reducing smoking prevalence has been equally successful across different occupational groups. However, more action is required to reduce the persistent inequality: the proportion of people who smoke from low paid and manual occupational groups was 61.7% in 2008 and remained at 61.6% in 2017.

Lead author, Dr Claire Garnett (UCL Department of Behavioural Science & Health), commented: “The decline in the proportion of smokers trying to quit or cut down is a worrying trend and may reflect budget cuts on tobacco control, including mass media expenditure and stop smoking services. These are known to be effective and it is a false economy to be cutting back on these.”

Kruti Shrotri, Cancer Research UK's tobacco control manager, said: "It's concerning that smokers are now less motivated to quit than a decade ago.

"Mass media campaigns such as Stoptober and January Health Harms are vital in encouraging people to quit smoking but have seen significant budget cuts in recent years. The Government must invest more in these health campaigns to save lives from cancers that could have been prevented."

Links

• Dr Claire Garnett's academic profile
• UCL Institute of Epidemiology and Health Care

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Credit: Pixabay

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