Started two weeks ago, the Tobacco Free Month, like every November since 2016, encourages smokers to commit to a process of stopping smoking.
This fifth edition is also the second to take place under the sign of Covid-19.
An important context while the health crisis has affected the habits of the French, including in their relationship to addictive consumption.
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A BVA - Addictions France survey published at the beginning of 2021 reveals that 35% of smokers increased their tobacco consumption during the year 2020. In its CoviPrev study, the Public Health organization France questioned smokers about their practices during the first confinement and shows that 27% of smokers believe they have increased their consumption, an increase which amounts to an average of 5 cigarettes among daily smokers. “
Since 2014, there has been a fairly clear drop in smoking in France. We went from nearly 30% of daily smokers in the adult population in 2014, to 25% in 2019. In 2020, this decrease was stopped
”, indicates Romain Guignard, in charge of scientific expertise at the Unit. addiction Public Health France. "
The main reason for the increase in tobacco is the boredom associated with this period, which was cited by 3/4 of respondents in CoviPrev.
For half of them, it was the stress, the anxiety of the situation that had caused an increase,
”he adds.
Contradictory trends
Conversely, some smokers reduced their consumption during confinement: this is the case for 19% of respondents in the Public Health France study. "
For some, it is an awareness of their smoking and the feeling that this period of confinement could be conducive to excesses,
" said Romain Guignard. Containment and closures of exit sites have forced the French to spend more time at home, which may have led some to quit smoking. Because, as noted by Anne-Laurence Le Faou, addictologist and president of the Association francophone de tabacologie, the environment plays a role in stopping smoking. "
Thinking about smoking and smoking at home, that is, exposing your family, having children who will ask their parents to stop, that can be a very positive motivation.
"
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These two distinct trends will they last?
The study by Public Health France, which is based exclusively on the first confinement, also reveals that 55% of smokers questioned have not changed their tobacco consumption over the period.
For Romain Guignard, it is anyway premeditated to draw conclusions about a long-term impact.
“
We saw in the study that for some smokers, there was a return to normal after confinement, but there is also a risk for some who may have increased their consumption of keeping these habits.
In the next studies that we are going to carry out, we will be able to see whether these deleterious behaviors persist or not.
For the moment it is difficult to determine, we do not have enough perspective on this.
"
Cigarette competition
Another visible development: cigarettes are no longer the only standard in tobacco sales. If the purchase of cigarettes decreased in France in 2020, continuing an overall decline that dates back several decades, this is not necessarily the case for other forms of tobacco. In a report, the French Observatory for Drugs and Drug Addiction explains that “
sales of other types of tobacco (cigars, cigarillos, pipe tobacco, snuff and chewing tobacco, etc.) also continue to grow strongly and represent now 5% of volumes. The increase is 17.4% on a constant day in 2020 (while sales fell 23% between 2010 and 2017)
”. An increase linked to marketing campaigns targeting young people, especially on social networks. "
Young people always try new things, it's an experimentation phase
, ”explains Anne-Laurence Le Faou.
“
We must especially look at the electronic cigarette because we realize that in many countries, it can be a factor of entry into tobacco.
In French studies, this is not found but it encourages us to be very vigilant
”.
Above all, the OFDT points to the increase in sales of rolling tobacco last year (+ 11.5% over one year), especially during the second and fourth quarters of 2020, i.e. during periods of confinement.
For the OFDT, it is to be expected that the increase in sales of hand-rolled tobacco may continue, due to a lower price than that of cigarettes.
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