Smoking fans fork out on average R263 a month to keep their cigarette puff habit in place
|Published
South Africa Cape Town 05- October- 2022 - A man Smoking in Adderley street Cape Town.Image:Ayanda Ndamane African News Agency (ANA)
South African cigarette smokers, many of whom are in low economic status, spend, on average, about R263 on cigarettes every month.
Yesterday, the Department of Health (NDoH) convened the second in a series of tobacco control webinars on various aspects of the Tobacco Products and Electronic Delivery Systems Control Bill. The webinar focused on the Global Adult Tobacco Survey (GATS) key results.
The NDoH chief director for Health Promotion, Nutrition, and Oral Health, Dr Lynn Moeng-Mahlangu, explained that the GATS is a global standard for systematically monitoring adult tobacco use (smoking and smokeless) and tracking key tobacco control indicators.
The GATS South Africa was conducted in 2021 by the South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC) and included men and women aged 15 years and older, who are usual residents in the country.
According to Dr Catherine Egbe, a specialist scientist for the SAMRC's alcohol, tobacco, and other drug research unit, tobacco use in South Africa is 29.4%, with 41.7% of men and 15.9% of women using it.
The GATS also revealed that the majority of smoked tobacco is used by men (41.1%), while the majority of smokeless tobacco (snuff or chewing tobacco) is consumed by women (7.2%).
Egbe said the use of tobacco in South Africa was concerning compared to other African countries that also conducted a GATS survey. The Botswana GATS revealed that the country's prevalence of tobacco use was 17.6%, and the Kenya GATS’ prevalence stands at 11.6%.
The GATS shows that the average amount spent on a pack of 20 cigarettes was R24.70, while the average amount spent on cigarettes monthly is about R263.10.
"Many people who smoke cigarettes are of low socio-economic status, which means that if someone is on a R350 grant, they spend nearly 75% of their money on cigarettes. This is worrying," Egbe said. She added that this figure is just for manufactured cigarettes and doesn’t include roll-your-own cigarettes, pipes, cigars, or e-cigarettes.
According to GATS, the prevalence of smoking by province is in the Northern Cape, followed by the Western Cape and the Eastern Cape, while the prevalence of cigarette smoking by province is in the Western Cape, followed by the Western Cape and Limpopo.
In terms of the use of e-cigarettes in South Africa, the current users stand at 2.2% of the estimated population, and 6.2% have ever used e-cigarettes.
By age, the majority of traditional smoked products (cigarettes and smoked tobacco) are used by the 45 to 64-year-old age group, while the majority of emerging tobacco products (hookahs and e-cigarettes) are used by the 15 to 24-year-old age group.
Egbe said the overall prevalence of hookah smoking is at 3,1%, with the highest prevalence among the 15 to 24 year age group, and the overall prevalence of e-cigarette use is at 2.2%.
In terms of stopping smoking, 62.6% of smokers wanted to quit because of their health and 11.7% quit smoking within the past 12 months before the survey.
Egbe further explained that 80.9% of the people who quit did it without assistance; 4.1% quit with pharmacotherapy; 2.9% quit with counselling or advice; and, 2.7% "quit" with e-cigarettes.
"We put e-cigarettes here because we know that there is propaganda by the e-cigarette industry that these products are for quitting," she said.
The department is set to expand more on the risks and use of e-cigarettes and the related products in the next webinar next month
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