Hard smoking north: NWT residents smoke more than the rest of Canada. Health costs attributed to tobacco use are pegged at $31 million a year
Lynn Lau
Northern News Services
Yellowknife (Jun 01/01) - A new report from Health and Social Services paints a troubling picture of smoking trends in the Northwest Territories.
Northerners of all ages smoke more, and are less likely to quit than other Canadians, the report suggests.
Health problems related to tobacco use in NWT are estimated to cost the health care system $33 million annually, said Jane Groenewegen, minister of Health and Social Services, at a news conference Thursday afternoon.
Smoke Alarm: a Summary Report on Smoking in the Northwest Territories is a compilation of data from four surveys completed in 1996 and 1999.
Groenewegen said the report provides baseline information that will be used to guide and measure government programming and nonsmoking initiatives.
According to the report, 42 per cent of NWT adults over the age of 17 are smokers, while over 60 per cent of aboriginal adults between the ages of 25 and 44 smoke. While this is the first report of its kind, comparisons to a school tobacco use survey in 1995 suggest that smoking rates are still going up.
Figures for the territory were well above the national average. In 1999, 25.2 per cent of Canadians over the age of 15 were smokers and in 2000 that figure dropped to 24 per cent, according to data released earlier this week by Health Canada.
"Overall in society we're not doing as well as other parts in Canada," said Dr. Andre Corriveau, NWT's chief medical officer. "We have to impact on social climate and the perception that people have about tobacco smoking and the tolerance people have towards children smoking. We all have to work on this issue, as a community, as a government, and as individuals."
The NWT report correlated smoking with socioeconomic factors like sex, ethnicity, age, education and community population size. Specifically, smoking rates were found to be higher among aboriginals, those under the age of 45, those with a lower level of education, and those living in smaller communities.
Women were only slightly more likely to be smokers than men.
Meanwhile, smoking rates among NWT children and adolescents are among the highest in the country. Of youth between the ages of 10 and 12, 41 per cent said they had never tried a cigarette, while nationally, 78 per cent of Canadian youth of the same age said they had never smoked.
Aboriginal youth of all age groups were found to be about three times more likely to be smokers than non-aboriginal youth. Among youth aged 10 to 17, 35 per cent of Metis, 36 per cent of Dene, and 46 per cent of Inuit said they were smokers.
Corriveau said the report points to a need for greater focus on preventing smoking among young people, and helping current smokers to quit.
The full report will soon posted on the Health and Social Services Web site at http://www.hlthss.gov.nt.ca.
