In the CDC story, McAfee claims "The percentage of smokers appears to hover around 20 percent as people take up the habit. But there has been a decline in the last five years in the rate of smoking, and smokers are actually smoking less," he added.
According the the CDC figures these were the smoking rates and percentages for the last five years:
2006 45.3 20.8
2007 43.4 19.8
2008 46.0 20.6
2009 46.6 20.6
2010 45.3 19.3
Looks pretty choppy to me. It averages out to 45.32 million. And if you go back 10 years, the total number of adult smokers continues to average around 45 million during that five year period and averages 45.36 million over the total 10-year period.
2001 46.2 22.8
2002 45.8 22.5
2003 45.4 21.6
2004 44.5 20.9
2005 45.1 20.9
The number of adult smokers in 1991 was 46.5 million, up from 43.8 million in 1990.
Now they have been telling us for years that 392,683 (approximately?) smokers die each year, and that each day, about 2,200 adults 18 years of age or older begin smoking on a daily basis. Math quiz: How many adult smokers are quitting each year?
Let's start with 1990, 43.8 million smokers.
43,800,000 1990 Smokers
- 392,683 Died
43,407,317 Old smokers left alive
+ 803,000 New smokers @ 2,200 per day
44,210,317 New total, before quitters
46,500,000 less the # smokers in 1991, according to CDC
(2,289,683) Number of smokers who quit (negative number - some of the previous year's quitters started up again?)
OK, maybe that's not a fair example. Let's take two consecutive years where the number went down
46,200,000 2001 Smokers
- 392,683 Died
45,807,317 Old smokers left alive
+ 803,000 New smokers @ 2,200 per day
46,610,317 New total, before quitters
45,800,000 less the # smokers in 1991, according to CDC
810,317 # quitters
1.77% Percent that quit
I'm glad that McAfee is happy with these results.
