Non-smokers on the advance - Health protection has priority

^{Destatis, 2 June 2010}

Smoking is considered today's highest avoidable health risk. Reduced tobacco consumption and maximum protection against the risks of passive smoking are therefore priority health policy goals pursued by the Federation and the Länder through various preventive and legal measures. This includes raising the tobacco tax, prohibiting the sale of cigarettes to children and juveniles, carrying out prevention campaigns, limiting advertisement, and protecting non-smokers at work and in restaurants.

In 2009, just under 87 billion cigarettes, some 3.8 billion cigars and cigarillos, over 24,000 tonnes of fine cut and a good 800 tonnes of pipe tobacco were sold in Germany. That corresponds to an average daily consumption of three cigarettes per head of the population – from infants to the aged, and not even counting the hand-rolled – and one additional cigar or cigarillo per week. What kind of people actually smoke and how much they consume is shown by the results of the microcensus.

Every fourth person over the age of 15 smokes

Non-smokers and smokers, 2009

Warnings of health risks involved in smoking are still ignored by many citizens. According to microcensus results, one quarter of those who were aged 15 or over and who provided information on their smoking behaviour were self-confessed smokers in 2009. That was 2% less than ten years ago. Most of them (22%) were regular smokers. Occasional smokers (4%) were much more seldom.

79% of the women and 69% of the men referred to themselves as non-smokers in 2009. Ten years ago, the share was nearly the same among women (78%), but it was slightly lower among men (65%).

The share of occasional smokers among women and men has remained nearly unchanged over the last ten years. Only for men smoking regularly, a marked decrease by 5 percentage points has been observed since 1999.

Smoking is out: Fewer young smokers than in the past

Regular smokers, 2009

In the last ten years, the top value of the age-specific share of smokers in the population has shifted towards younger age groups, that is the 25 to 30 year old men and the 20 to 25 year old women. A positive trend is observed among the very young population groups, that is juveniles and young adults aged 15 to under 20 years: The share of smokers has markedly decreased since 1999 from 22% to 16% among men and from 16% to 12% among women in those age groups.

Who smokes what – and how much?

96% of the smokers use cigarettes, 3% cigars and cigarillos and just 1% pipes. The shisha (water pipe), which in 2009 was for the first time included in the survey, has no importance when considering all age groups. It is smoked by 2% of young men aged 15 to under 20 years and by 1% of the women in that age group.

A major factor determining the individual health risk caused by smoking is the quantity of tobacco consumed. More than three quarters (80%) of regular cigarette smokers indicated to smoke an average of 5 to 20 cigarettes per day. 14% smoked more than 20 cigarettes per day. According to the definition of the World Health Organisation, the latter are classified as heavy smokers. Only 7% of the regular cigarette smokers quantified their cigarette consumption to be low – under five cigarettes per day.

Obviously, more and more smokers change over to medium consumption: Since 1999, the share of heavy smokers has continuously decreased from 18% to 14%. However, the share of those smoking 5 to 20 cigarettes a day has even slightly increased since 1999 (74%).

Differences between men and women were also observed with regard to the quantity of cigarettes smoked per day. Among male regular smokers, every sixth (17%) was classified as a heavy smoker, while among female regular smokers it was only every tenth (10%). However, the share of women smoking less than 5 cigarettes a day was nearly twice as high (9%) as that of men (5%).

Younger starting age today

The point in time when people start smoking also has an impact on their health risk. Within the last 50 years, the starting age has dramatically decreased: In 2009, men aged 65 to under 70 years at the time of the survey indicated to have started smoking at the age of 18.5 years. Women in the same age group had not started smoking until the age of 21.9 years.

Younger people generally indicate a younger starting age than older persons. Especially younger women are some months ahead of men of the same age. Men aged 15 to under 20 years indicated to have started smoking at the age of 15.6 years, while for women of the same age it was 15.2 years. In the age group of 20 to under 25 years, too, women started smoking at 15.7 years on average, which is slightly earlier than men of the same age (16.0 years). In the subsequent age groups, that relation is reversed; men indicate to have started smoking earlier than women and the starting age shifts towards an older age. On an average of all age groups, men started smoking at the age of 17.5 years and women at 18.3 years.

Smokers’ wisdom comes with age…

The group of non-smokers (74%) is composed of "never-smokers" (54%) and former smokers (20%). The share of non-smokers grows along with the respondents’ age, the lowest value (62%) being observed among the 25 to under 30 year olds. For those aged over 75 years, the share of non-smokers is 95%.

64% of the women indicated never to have smoked. Among men, that share is just 45%. Consequently, the smoking quit rate, that is the share of former smokers, is larger for men (25%) than for women (15%). However, women quit smoking earlier than men. Until the age of 35, they have a higher smoking quit rate.

Money is not the reason

Higher income does not go along with higher tobacco consumption as might be assumed. The opposite is true: While in households with a monthly income of up to EUR 1,300 the share of smokers is 33%, it is 24% in the income group of EUR 2,600 to EUR 4,500 and 19% in households with an income of over EUR 4,500.

Bitter end

A glance at the causes of death statistics should be reason enough for any smoker to quit smoking: Lung, trachea or larynx cancer – types of cancer brought into relation with tobacco consumption – were the fourth most frequent cause of death in 2008. The average age at death was 69.9 years for the persons concerned, which is 7 years below average.

Apart from those cancer types it must be assumed that the consumption of tobacco may have contributed to a large number of deaths, especially in the context of cardiovascular diseases or the chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).

Author:
Evelyn Laue – Federal Statistical Office

For further questions please use our contact form.