Regional Variation of Tobacco Use in Bangladesh

Mahbubus Sobhan, Sheikh Mohammad

INTRODUCTION: Tobacco use is a major public health problem in Bangladesh having a dual burden of high production and consumption. Death toll from tobacco is in increasing trend. Global Adult Tobacco Survey (GATS) 2009 report shows 43.3% people uses tobacco either in smoking or smokeless form. 23% of the population smokes bidi, cigarette, hookah etc. 27.2% people uses smokeless tobacco like zarda (chewing tobacco), sada pata (tobacco leaf), gul (powdered tobacco), nossi (snuff) etc. Tobacco control stakeholders narrate country prevalence in most of the papers, meetings, seminars, but there is a dire need of regional (divisional) prevalence. Getting that data, specific measure can be tailored for each division. So we ventured to analyze the divisional prevalence.

METHODS: Objective of the research was to examine the variation of prevalence of tobacco use in different divisions. Data from GATS 2009 conducted in Bangladesh was analyzed. The data consists of 9,629 respondents from a nationally representative geographically clustered multi-stage probability sample of adults aged 15 years and above. Tobacco use in different divisions was examined by type and gender using SPSS version 16.0.

RESULTS: The study shows following prevalence in different divisions (smoking & Smokeless): Dhaka (24.2% & 27.8%), Chittagong (23.3% & 19.5%), Rajshahi (23.5% & 24.3%), Khulna (19.9% & 30.8%), Sylhet (27.1% & 37.6%), Barisal (17% & 39.4%) and Rangpur (24% & 34.3%). Among males, smoking prevalence is highest in Sylhet (56.3%) and lowest in Barisal (37.5%) and among females, highest in Chittagong (3.1%) and lowest in Khulna (0.3%). Conversely, among males prevalence of smokeless tobacco use is highest in Barisal (44.7%) and lowest in Chittagong (16.7%) and among females, highest in Sylhet (49.6%) and lowest in Chittagong (21.9%).

CONCLUSIONS: Ongoing surveillance in all divisions of Bangladesh is necessary to measure the progress towards curbing the tobacco epidemic. Definite interventions can be applied in highly endangered areas.