Smoke Bombs
A study in the New Zealand Journal of Medicine questions the validity of the MoH statistics which suggest that smoking has decreased from 22.8% to 18.1%. The actual article can be found here (PDF). They reason (correctly) that since current cigarette sales increased 7.5% from 3957 to 4253 million cigarettes, all remaining smokers would have to be smoking more than 30 cigarettes a day, in order to account for the increase. The average is still 15/day.
I love it when simple mathematics shows complex statistics to be nonsense.
The reason for the discrepancy is obvious. So obvious that it should have caused the statisticians at the MoH to rethink their approach to gathering data. It is no longer cool to smoke.
Typically, surveys rely on responders telling the truth. However the stigma against smoking is now so large that people are reluctant to admit they smoke, particularly if their habit is small. In addition, the adults who have quit smoking have almost certainly been replaced by young people who traditionally do not answer surveys, or answer them untruthfully (often because they are within earshot of their parents!)
The 7.5% increase in the total number of cigarettes sold is very worrying. Typically, habitual smokers do not vary the number of cigarettes smoked per day. Increases in the number of cigarettes sold will predominantly be new smokers (people restarting generally do so within the year and do not effect annual stats). Predominantly, the new smokers will all be young (smoking advertising is aimed predominantly at the young). Now for some scary maths:
Annual increase in sales = 296 million/year
Increase in daily cigarette consumption = 810,959/day
Average daily consumption = 15/day
Likely number of new smokers = 54,000
It is true that a proportion of these smokers will be new immigrants – nett immigration over the period of the study was 117,000. Assuming 20% smoke that’s 23,400 smokers, leaving 30,600. Most of these will be kids and the real number will be higher (Closer to 46,000), because the average number of cigarettes smoked is only 10/day under the age of 25 years.
About one third will become hopelessly addicted to cigarettes meaning that 15,000 extra adults will be burdening the health system with heart attacks, emphysema and various cancers in about 20 years time. On top of all the older smokers coming through the system. Clearly, the antismoking campaign is not working as well as thought.
Some perspective:
Between 2003 and 2007, kids started smoking at the rate of 25 new smokers a day (see why tobacco companies survive?)
5 of them will die before the age of 60 of a smoking related illness
another 5 of them will spend most of their retirement years in and out of hospital
And people wonder why doctors hate smoking so much…
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Feb 28 09 12:31 am
Under Labour, we had some of the harshest anti-tobacco laws ever. Taxes rose dramatically, cigar bars were closed down and smokers refused the right of shelter in public areas. Government advertising successfully portrayed smokers as something between lepers and paedophiles. And not a damned thing has changed. People still smoke. Human nature 1, nanny state nil.
Considering how much excise tax the state has milked off me since I began smoking, I must have paid for my iron lung by now. And those 5 smokers who die before 60 save the state money on Super and health services, which would easily cancel out whatever cost the other five’s hospital bills might be. Then there’s the other 15 of the 25 who smoke and lead perfectly normal lives.
Feb 28 09 8:02 am
Will: You are incorrect. Much has changed. Society has changed it’s attitude towards smokers – they are considered a nuisance rather than “cool” or “sophisticated”. This destroys decades of media advertising by the tobacco companies. Plenty of people are stopping smoking, it’s just that many young people are starting.
The excise tax paid currently by a 20/day smoker will cover only about half of their medical bills over time (unfortunately, I can’t find the reference for this Australian study). You are also discounting the appalling social cost and loss of productivity from smoking.
The remaining 15 BTW, will not necessarily be free of health consequences – they will just not prematurely die or be extremely ill.
Feb 28 09 9:28 am
I respectfully beg to differ. Young people have no access to the tobacco advertising of the sort you mention. Tobacco advertising has been largely absent over the last 20 years. No more B&H Fashion Awards, dairies are now plastered in Coke ads as opposed to smoke ads.
One day I’ll get around to calculating how much excise tax I have paid from the habit. I have yet to be spend one health dollar on smoking related illness, so the balance sheet seems to be in my favour.
So far, so good, Will
And, as far as advertising goes, pay careful attention to movies and take a look at the “wall of death” behind the counter at your corner shop or supermarket.
Feb 28 09 5:41 pm
Bob Jones figured all this out 20 odd years ago.
He observed that smokers seemed to lead a charmed health life up to the mid 40s and gradually succumbed to the weed after that.
Using the brain that made him many millions, he suggested that all children from age 3 should be introduced to the weed and have them up to a pack a day by the teens. Then from the 40s, all smokers should be weaned off the habit.
The logical result would be the robust health of the smoker in youth and the longevity of the non smoker in the Golden Years.
JC
This would be why logic without common sense is dumb…
Feb 28 09 9:17 pm
I still think the best solution to the smoking problem is to make health care user pays.
Perhaps not, Madelaine. The incidence of smoking in the US is higher than here. People just don’t get long-term health effects.
Mar 1 09 9:47 am
MacDoctor, people don’t get long term effects full stop. We live in a society that demands instant gratification. “Must have” is an advertising tag line.
We also live in a society that frowns on personal responsibility, so of course there can be no long term effect from my behaviour right now.
Nicotine is the ultimate instantaneous hit, legal drug available and while it is legal it will stay around the 20% mark who are smokers.
Mar 3 09 5:35 am
Hi Doc,
I’m a smoker. The tax hikes when I was a lad had then raised prices to more than double the nominal retail price.
These tax hikes did not have the intended effect on young smokers. True, we may have smoked fewer cigarettes, but smoking became even more of a status symbol. A pack of imported smokes, which were even more expensive than the locally made ones, became as much a necessity as condoms if you were out to the clubs for the evening.
Another side-effect was a rise in smuggling, to the point where as many as half of all smokes sold here were estimated to be free-market smokes with no tax paid. Showing up at the clubs with a couple packs of free market smokes was even cooler, in my day, than having expensive foreign brands unless, of course, those smokes were both foreign and smuggled into the coutry unlawfully.
A pack of smokes is now 4 to 5 times the nominal retail where I live, and the unintended consequences remain. I’ve seen it at the local school and coffee shops.
Mar 3 09 10:02 am
crjc: Interesting observation. It is a simple (or simplistic?) economic truism that raising the price reduces the usage. As you point out though, if the object (in this case cigarettes) can be obtained through some other means (barter, theft, illegal import) then the effect will essentially flatline.
Increasing the price further might reduce the number of cigarettes smoked (I’m doubtful of this) but it will do nothing to the number of smokers.
The real place to tackle smokers would be to make it uncool to smoke for young people. I am uncertain how to tackle this (probably too old!) but one thing is certain, those corny TV adverts don’t help.