74% of adults in England support the Government’s goal to reduce smoking prevalence to below 5% by 2030.

Key to reaching this goal is making sure the next generation can no longer be harmed by tobacco.

Most smokers start as young people, and the earlier someone starts smoking, the more significant the health, social, and economic harms they face throughout their lives.

Children are more likely to take up smoking if they live with people who smoke. The best way to reduce smoking among young people is to reduce it in the world around them.

Around 60%

of smokers want to quit, 10% of whom intend to do so within 3 months

26 children

start smoking every day

60 families a week

lose a loved one to smoking

In order to reduce smoking prevalence we must:

  1. Reduce uptake:

    make smoking unappealing to both smokers and non-smokers.

  2. Increase quit attempts:

    make it appealing for smokers to quit for good.

  3. Increase success rate of quit attempts:

    Provide a tailored and tenacious approach to stop smoking support.

What do we know:

  • Smoking is financially draining, and making smoking obsolete could restore over £11bn back into household budgets lifting 2.6million adults and 1 million children out of poverty.
  • Disadvantages smokers are least likely to try to quit and less likely to succeed.
  • Smoking is the leading cause of preventable disease, disability and premature death in England.
  • Smokers are 36% more likely to be admitted to hospital and need social care 10 years before they should.
  • People with mental health conditions die 10 to 20 years earlier, and the biggest factor in this is smoking.
  • Smokers loose on average 10 years of life, or around 1 year for every 4 years of smoking after the age of 30.
  • Around a third of households with a smoker fall below the poverty line.

Join 1618 others committed to End Smoking Together.