Analysis on smoking pattern and relative risk factors in inhabitants aged 15 or elder in Guangdong province

  Objective   To know smoking prevalence and relative risk factors in Guangdong inhabitants and to develop effecive tobacco control policies.

  Methods   Based on the Guangdong prov ince inhabitants nutrition and health survey conduced in 2002, smoking data of a sample(17 489 cases)aged 15 or elder were collected to make a descriptive analysis.

  Results   The smoking rate was 24.6%, standardized rate was 20.7%, males(45.5%)was higher than that of females(1.1%); rural (23.8%)was higher than that of city(17.3%); the standardized cur rent smoking rate, regular smoking rate, heavy smoking rate was 20.2%, 19.3% and 10.8% respectively, w hich were higher in males than that in females; average age of starting smoking(median)was 20.0 years old; Standar dized current quit smoking rate and relapse rate was 1.7% and 9.1% respectively.Age, region, sex, educational level, occupation, marital status were relative risk factors of current smokers(OR value was 1.07, 0.01, 1.42, 0.89, 1.14, 1.75 respectively).

  Conclusion   The majority of the population was exposed to tobacco environment.A series control measures, such as health policy, supporting environment, dissemination of tobacco knowledge, study of quit smoking skill, intrvention on high risk population, should be conducted.