New Delhi:
Almost 10 years later after cigarettes were prohibited from Britain's pubs, clubs, bars and restaurants, smoking levels are at an all-time low in the country according to new research.
Currently, there are now 1.9 million less smokers in the country compared with 2007 when the smoking ban was first enforced, according to the latest statistics from Cancer Research UK, a British charity.
Anti-smoking laws have had one of the largest effects on public health over the last decade.
"We're thrilled that 10 years on, the smoking ban has been such an enormous success," Sir Harpal Kumar, Cancer Research UK's Chief Executive Officer, said in a statement.
"As well as protecting people from the deadly effects of passive smoking, we've also seen big changes in public attitudes towards smoking. It's now far less socially acceptable and we hope this means fewer young people will fall into such a potentially lethal addiction," he added.
In 2016 there were currently approximately 8.3 million adult smokers in Britain. In 2007 there were around 10.2 million current adult cigarette smokers in Great Britain, the statistics revealing a difference of 1.9 million, according to the computations made by the Statistical Information Team at Cancer Research UK.
The reduction in the number of smokers means there are now around 8,300,000 adult smokers in Britain, Cancer Research UK reported on Saturday.
Significantly, over this ten-year span of clean air in pubs, the percentage of 16 to 24-year-old smokers has dropped to 17 per cent from 26 per cent in 2007 –which is an all-time low.
The decrease in this age group is larger than in any other, the results revealed.
A new survey for Cancer Research UK conducted on more than 4,300 people also showed that very few people want to reverse the prohibition and allow smoking in enclosed public spaces.
Only 12 per cent were in favour of reversing the smoke free laws, the results also showed.
Maximum people believe the prohibition on smoking has had encouraging effect only eight per cent think this ban has made not altered their smoking habits in any way.
Twenty per cent of smokers said the ban had been helpful in reducing the number of cigarettes smoked and a remarkable 14 per cent of ex-smokers praise the ban with helping them leave smoking totally.
Almost four in 10 (38 per cent) people across Britain opine that the forbidding of smoking has helped discourage the next generation from the habit of smoking.
