Managing smoking cessation in primary care

The UK has experienced a dramatic reduction in smoking prevalence of about 75% over the last 60 years (Royal College of Physicians (RCP), 2021). However, if the recent, rather slow, rate of reduction continues, it is predicted that the UK will still be a long way from eradicating smoking by 2050, a plan that was advocated in the 1962 UK White Paper ‘Smoking and Health’ (RCP, 1962). Despite the reduction in smoking prevalence in the UK, smoking remains the most important avoidable cause of premature death and disability in the UK, and the biggest preventable cause of cancer. The latest figures show that 14.1% of people aged 18 years or older smoke cigarettes, which equates to around 6.9 million individuals (Cancer Research UK, 2022). Worryingly, a new study found that the number of 18–34-year-olds in England who smoke, increased by 25% during the first lockdown, meaning that there are over 652 000 more young adults who smoke than before the pandemic (Jackson et al, 2022).