Huge fall in smoking

The number of daily smokers in France fell by one million between 2016 and 2017, according to a story on euronews.com citing the results of a new survey by the country’s public health agency.
This fall, which meant that the incidence of smoking among people 18-75 years of age went from 29.4 percent to 26.9 percent, was reportedly described by Public Health France as historic.
The survey found also that, for the first time since 2000, there was a ‘notable decline’ in daily smoking among the ‘most disadvantaged’ smokers, including low-income earners and the unemployed.
French Health Minister Agnes Buzyn was quoted as saying that anti-smoking measures, including the so-called “sin” tax on nicotine, standardized packaging and health warnings, were largely responsible for the “encouraging” trend.
Sharing the news on Twitter, Buzyn wrote: “Good news that strengthens my commitment to the prevention and health of all”.
Buzyn plans to raise the price of a pack of cigarettes to €10 by 2020, up from almost €8 today after a series of hikes in recent years.
It was necessary “to continue this major fight against one of the biggest scourges of public health,” she said.
Meanwhile, according to an RFI story relayed by the US-based TMA, Buzyn said the so-called “sin” tax on nicotine was largely to thank for the trend, boosted by state-reimbursed cessation counselling and nicotine patches, standardized packaging and health warnings.
But the UK-based Tobacco Manufacturers’ Association earlier this month quoted Buzyn, as saying that: “Plain packaging did not contribute to the decrease of official tobacco sales”.