Smoking quit rates stall as anti-tobacco funding declines

People with tobacco-related chronic diseases are more likely to smoke than are those who are not sick.

By Stephanie Stapleton, AMNews staff. Dec. 3, 2007.

The number of Americans giving up cigarettes may have hit a plateau.

A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention analysis of 2006 data found that approximately 20.8% of U.S. adults -- about 45 million -- are cigarette smokers. This prevalence, which has held steady since 2004, suggests a stall in the previous seven-year decline. During that period, the proportion of smokers shrank from 24.7% to 20.9%.

Public health and tobacco control advocates point to recent developments in which state tobacco control funds have been reallocated and policy initiatives have faced roadblocks as possible explanations for the slowing quit rates. They also view the report as a wake-up call.

"It's not as disheartening as it is a call to work harder at what we know [is effective]," said Thomas J. Glynn, PhD, the American Cancer Society's director of cancer science and trends.

Smoking rates have been on a downturn since a 1964 surgeon general's report linked lung cancer and cigarette use. At that time, an estimated 42% of the American population were smokers. But more than 400,000 people still die each year from smoking-related illnesses and, for every death, 20 more people are living with such conditions.

The CDC analysis was based on information collected from the National Health Interview Survey's nationally representative sample of 24,275 people 18 or older. The study, published in the Nov. 9 Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, was done to measure progress toward the national health objective of reducing adult cigarette smoking prevalence to less than 12% by 2010.