![Tobacco: 1 million French people have quit smoking in one year](https://img.passeportsante.net/1000x526/2018-05-29/i85781-.jpeg)
May 29, 2018.
The number of people who smoke in France continues to decline. The awareness campaigns and the increase in the price of the package ended up convincing a large number of smokers.
A million fewer smokers
Over the past year, the number of smokers in France has fallen significantly: according to the Ministry of Health, a million people have quit smoking in the past 12 months. In 2017, 26.9% of 18-75 year olds smoked every day, compared to 29.4% a year earlier. Pleasant news for the Minister of Health Agnès Buzyn. ” These results are encouraging, they mark a break She said at a press conference.
” With the increase in taxation, we can hope that these results will be sustainable She added. It is indeed, according to her, the increase in the price of the package that allowed this great movement. The World Health Organization (WHO) has for its part estimated thata 10% increase in the price of a packet of cigarettes resulted in a 4% decrease in sales. Government policy is therefore certainly in question.
A sharp decline even among the most disadvantaged
Two categories of the population are particularly affected by this smoking cessation: men aged 18 to 24 (44% in 2016 against 35% in 2017) and women aged 55 to 64 (21% against 18% in 2017). There are also some disparities between regions. Île-de-France and Pays-de-Loire are the regions where we smoked the least in 2017 (between 21.3% and 23% of the population smoked).
On the other hand, there are still many smokers in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region (32.1% of the population), in Hauts-de-France (30.5%), in Occitanie (30.3% ) and in the Grand-Est (30.1%). Among the most disadvantaged also, tobacco is declining. We went from 39% of smokers in 2016 to 34% in 2017 among low-income people and from 50% to 44% among unemployed people. Good news !
Marine Rondot
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