One million French smokers quit in a year amid anti - smoking measures

France has seen a sharp fall in the number of people smoking daily, with one million fewer lighting up from 2016-2017, a survey suggests. Such a drop has not been seen in a decade, according to Public Health France, which carried out the study. There has also been a decline in smoking among teenagers and those on low incomes. The study pointed to the slew of anti-smoking measures introduced to France as a likely reason for the decline.

Recent years have seen neutral packaging, reimbursements for people using tobacco substitutes, higher cigarette pricing and campaigns like the national tobacco-free month.

According to the survey, in 2017 26.9% of 18- to 75-year-olds smoked every day, compared with 29.4% a year earlier. This amounts to a drop from 13.2 million smokers to 12.2 million over the period. France's Health Minister Agnès Buzyn, in particular, welcomed the decline in smoking among those on low incomes, saying that "tobacco is a trajectory of inequality, it weighs particularly on the most disadvantaged and it gets worse".