A joint survey by Egypt’s Ministry of Health and Population and the World Health Organization has found that 22.8 percent of Egyptians are consumers of tobacco in various forms, according to an Asharq Al-Awsat story.
Among men, the figure is 43.6 percent, while among women it is 0.5 percent.
Dr. Doaa Al-Saleh, co-ordinator of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), seemed to suggest that the figure for smoking among women was an underestimate due to the methodology of the survey. The researchers had visited people in their homes where, in the presence of a husband, father or brother, a woman was most likely to deny smoking whether she did or did not.
Saleh said that in the future researchers hoped to conduct interviews with women in places such as universities and clubs, where they were more likely to give the correct answers.
Smoking a male preserve
