France’s national health body, Santé Publique France, has published a map of smoking patterns across the country revealing some unexpected regional findings, according to a story in The Local France.
For example, Parisians are the least likely to take up smoking. About 21 percent of people living in the greater Paris region of Ile-de France are smokers, the lowest rate in the country, and it is followed by the regions of Pays de La Loire, in second place with 23 percent, and Normandy, in third place with 25.6 percent.
By contrast, in Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur in the south east, smokers make up 32 percent of the population.
That makes people from Marseilles and their coastal counterparts the heaviest smokers in France.
And while Normandy overall had a below average rate of smokers, it has, at 7.5 percent, the highest proportion of 17-year-old smokers.
Overall, the Local reported, anti-tobacco campaigns and price hikes seemed to be convincing the French to quit smoking. The number of smokers in the country dropped by about one million to 12.2 million between 2016 and 2017.
Santé Publique France reported also that smoking levels were linked to income and education levels.
It said that the higher the level of wealth and education, the lower the chances of having nicotine dependency and the higher the probabilities of responding to health awareness campaigns.