Women and Smoking

• Women's smoking rates dropped 35 percent since their peak in 1965, yet 22.1 percent of adult women were still current smokers in 1997. Most of the decline in smoking among women occurred from 1974 through 1990.

Source:
Surgeon General's Report: http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/sgr/sgr_forwomen/factsheet_tobaccouse.htm#Prevalence

• Current cigarette smoking estimates for the United States are that about 22 million women (22 percent) are smokers, putting them at increased risk of heart attack and stroke.

Source:
http://www.americanheart.org/statistics/biostats/biowo.htm

• An estimated 17 percent of pregnant women age 15-44 smoked cigarettes in the past month, compared to 31 percent of non-pregnant women of the same age.

Source:
http://www.samhsa.gov/statistics/statistics.htm
http://www.health.org/govstudy/shortreports/femalctob/

• About 24 percent of non-Hispanic white women, 22 percent of non-Hispanic black women, 14 percent of Hispanic women, 12 percent of Asian / Pacific Islander women and 30 percent of American Indian/Alaska Native women are estimated to be smokers.

Source:
http://www.americanheart.org/statistics/biostats/biowo.htm

• Smoking by women in this country causes almost as many deaths from heart disease as from lung cancer.

Source:
http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/public/heart/other/hdw_smk.htm

• Teenage girls often start to smoke to avoid weight gain. They also seek to identify themselves as independent and glamorous, which reflect images projected by tobacco ads. In 1999, 34.9 percent of high school girls were current smokers, meaning they smoked at least once in the 30 days preceding the survey. In addition, 15.6 percent were frequent smokers.

Source:
http://www.lungusa.org/tobacco/women_factsheet99.html

• Surveys show that among high school senior girls, past-month current smoking rates decreased from 39.9% in 1977 to 25.8% in 1992, but increased to 35.3% during 1997. In 2000, smoking prevalence declined again to 29.7%.
  
  
• In 1998, nearly 14 million women of reproductive age were smokers, and smoking prevalence in this group was higher (25.3%) than in the overall population of women aged 18 years or older (22.0%).

Source:
Surgeon General's Report: http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/sgr/sgr_forwomen/factsheet_tobaccouse.htm#Prevalence

• Smoking during pregnancy appears to have decreased from 1989 through 1998. Despite increased knowledge of the adverse health effects of smoking during pregnancy, estimates of women smoking during pregnancy range from 12.9 percent to as high as 22 percent.

Source:
Surgeon General's Report, At a Glance: http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/sgr/sgr_forwomen/ataglance.htm

• A higher percentage of women stop smoking during pregnancy, both spontaneously and with assistance, than at other times in their lives. Using pregnancy-specific programs can increase smoking cessation rates, which benefits infant health and is cost effective. Only about one-third of women who stop smoking during pregnancy are still abstinent one year after the delivery.

Source:
Surgeon General's Report, At a Glance: http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/sgr/sgr_forwomen/ataglance.htm

• Smoking during pregnancy is estimated to account for 20 to 30 percent of low-birth weight babies, up to 14 percent of preterm deliveries, and some 10 percent of all infant deaths. The odds of developing asthma are twice as high among children whose mothers smoke more than 10 cigarettes a day. Between 400,000 and 1 million asthmatic children have their condition worsened by exposure to secondhand smoke.

Source:
http://www.lungusa.org/tobacco/pregnancy_factsheet99.html