The French smoke more and more. According to the results of a Public Health France study, published on Tuesday, tobacco consumption started to increase again in 2021 after having stagnated in 2020. In 2021, in metropolitan France, more than three out of 10 adults aged 18-75 declared smoke (31.9%), and a quarter daily (25.3%). Compared to 2020, these figures show no significant variations. But, compared to 2019, before the Covid crisis, the prevalence of smoking has increased (30.4% at the time).
“This is not good news, reacted this morning on Franceinfo the Minister of Health and Prevention François Braun. We had managed to significantly reduce smoking with 2 million people who had quit smoking and this recovery with 700,000 people who started smoking again, this is not good news”.
Although it has not, overall, changed “significantly” (25.3% in 2021 against 24% in 2019), daily smoking has, for its part, increased among women (23% against 20.7 %) and among those with few or no qualifications (32% versus 29%). “What concerns me is all this accumulation of bad signs,” added the minister. “We are told that the increase is concentrated among the most modest, those who are the furthest from care, there is an accumulation of inequalities”.
Possible “Covid effect” on the rise
To explain these results, Public Health France judges that “an impact of the social and economic crisis linked to Covid-19 cannot be excluded”. Among women, the increase in smoking could be linked in part to the stronger impact of this crisis for them, according to the study. And the psychological, economic and social consequences of the Covid crisis have been “more marked” in disadvantaged populations, where “cigarettes can be perceived as a tool for managing stress or overcoming daily difficulties”.
In addition to social inequalities that are still very marked (more daily smokers among the unemployed or workers in particular), regional differences persist. Occitanie (28.5%) and Paca (29.1%) had a higher prevalence of daily smoking in 2021 than the rest of France, Ile-de-France and Pays-de-la-Loire lower (22.4%). The proportion of smokers in the Overseas Territories is lower than that of mainland France.
“Not impossible that the price of the package will increase further”
After two years of relative stability, the price of a pack of cigarettes will increase in 2023. The Social Security Finance Bill (PLFSS) provides for an increase of 50 cents this year and 35 cents in 2024. “The price of the pack will increase like inflation. It would be quite paradoxical for the increase in cigarettes to be lower than inflation,” said the Minister of Health on Franceinfo. “Otherwise it would mean that eventually the price of cigarettes would be lower.” Between 2017 and 2020, with six successive increases, the price of a pack of cigarettes jumped by almost 50%, exceeding the symbolic threshold of 10 euros in March 2020. But until now, the successive increases in the price of the package were largely disconnected from annual inflation and pursued above all a logic of public health policy. “It is not impossible that there is still a rise in price,” added the Minister, also indicating that other tobacco products, such as burning tobacco, would follow the same evolution.
As for prevention, François Braun does not rule out changing gears and moving towards so-called positive prevention. In other words, to replace shocking images attached to cigarette packs to convey more positive messages related to quitting smoking. “I defend a positive strategy for prevention. For example, when we highlight healthy sport, it’s not to say that you have to do sport to be healthy, but to explain that if you take the stairs, you will feel better in your daily life”.
Tobacco remains the leading cause of preventable death in France, with some 75,000 deaths each year. The objective set by the authorities is to achieve a tobacco-free generation by 2032.