
Could a generation of people eliminate tobacco use to increase the odds against respiratory disease? Researchers from the University of Santiago de Compostela in Spain and the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) published a new, first-of-its-kind study calculating the impact of such an action.
Published in The Lancet Public Health, the simulation study predicts that approximately 1.2 million lung cancer deaths could be avoided by 2095 if the sale of cigarettes and other tobacco products is banned in 185 countries for people who were born between 2006 and 2010.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), smoking is the leading cause of preventable death worldwide as well as the biggest risk factor for developing lung disease or lung cancer. The study’s findings suggest that forming a generation of individuals who are tobacco-free could significantly reduce the impact of tobacco on lung cancer mortality for years to come.
“Lung cancer is a major killer worldwide, and a staggering two-thirds of deaths are linked to one preventable risk factor — tobacco smoking,” said lead author Julia Rey Brandariz, PhD, in a news release. “Our modeling highlights how much there is to gain for governments considering the implementation of ambitious plans towards creating a tobacco-free generation. Not only could this save huge numbers of lives, it could massively reduce the strain on health systems of treating and caring for people in ill health as a result of smoking.”
Since the legal buying age for tobacco products is 18 years in most countries, the study focused on people who were born between 2006 and 2010. The research team examined historical data on 82 countries pulled from the WHO Mortality Database to forecast future death rates of lung cancer. Then, the team applied its estimates against data from the GLOBOCAN 2022 database, an IARC global cancer statistics platform, to finalize its predictions for 185 countries.
“While rates of smoking in high-income countries have fallen in recent years, lung cancer remains a leading cause of death and disease,” said author Isabelle Soerjomataram, PhD, from the IARC. “In low- and middle-income countries, which have rapidly growing populations of young people, the impact of banning tobacco sales could be even greater.”
Limitations to the study included lack of data in certain geographical regions and the inability to account for implementation and compliance factors. Additionally, the study had limited data on the rate of lung cancer in people who have never smoked, and it did not account for the use of e-cigarettes.
Percentage of prevented lung-cancer deaths as a proportion of total prevented deaths in the 2006–2010 birth cohort, by country-income group. (A) Male individuals. (B) Female individuals. (C) Total.DOI: 10.1016/S2468-2667(24)00185-3