Theme 1: Determinants of Health and Wellbeing

Smoking prevalence

Theme 1: Determinants of Health and Wellbeing

Theme 2: Lifestyle Factors

Background Information

Smoking is the principal avoidable cause of premature death and ill health in England today. It kills an estimated 86,500 people a year (one-fifth of all deaths) and leads to an extra 560,000 admissions to hospital. Reducing prevalence is therefore a key priority in improving the health of the population.

Data

This data represents the number of people (aged over 16) reporting that they currently either smoked every day or occasionally, as a proportion of the total sample surveyed. The source of the data is the 2007 North West Regional Lifestyle survey which included a random sample of 8752 people in Cumbria.

Cumbria

17% of people in the survey reported that they were currently smokers (18% - men; 16%-women). This is noticeably lower than the prevalence modelled for Cumbria using data from the 2003-2005 Health survey for England (25.7%). It is however not significantly different than a previous postal survey conducted by IPSOS MORI in Cumbria which gave an estimate of 18% (Cumbria Quality of Life Survey). It is however likely that self reported smoking underestimates the true level of smoking. This data would imply that there are about 70,000 adults in Cumbria who smoke. Although data is not directly comparable, the level of smoking appears to be lower than the average for England as a whole. Nationally in 2005 24% of people reported that they smoked.

Districts within Cumbria

Table 1: Reported smoking prevalence from the North West Lifestyle Survey and estimated number of smokers in each district

District / Prevalence / 95% CI / Estimated total number of smokers
Barrow-in-Furness / 21% / 19-24% / 12,622
Copeland / 19% / 16-22% / 10,700
Carlisle / 18% / 16-20% / 15,234
Allerdale / 18% / 16-20% / 13,447
South Lakeland / 14% / 12%-17% / 11,872
Eden / 13% / 12%-15% / 5,803

The smoking prevalence is highest in Barrow-in-Furness and lowest in Eden (Table 1). However the number of smokers is highest in Carlisle which has nearly three times the number of smokers as in Eden.

Inequality within Cumbria

The graph below shows the smoking prevalence for the population of Cumbria divided into five groups based on the level of social deprivation in the area in which people live. It shows that the level of smoking increases as you move from the most affluent areas to the most deprived. The fifth of the population living in the most deprived areas are twice as likely to smoke as the fifth of the population living in the most affluent area. To reduce the level of smoking across Cumbria to that found in the most affluent areas, there would need to be about 25,000 fewer people smoking.

Figure 1: Smoking Prevalence in Cumbria by Deprivation Quintile (Source North West Lifestyle Survey)

02 October 2008