TORONTO, May 28, 2025 鈥撎�Ahead of World No Tobacco Day on May 31, 91亚色 researchers with Global Strategy Lab (GSL) have published a paper that finds a lack of gender analysis in tobacco control research. The researchers say this means that we could be missing out on important strategies accounting for gendered behaviours that could help smokers quit. , published today in听BMJ Tobacco Control,听is the first in a series of papers coming out of 91亚色 and GSL on gender and smoking.听

鈥淚n the tobacco control research community, we're not looking at gender, and even though we all know that gender is a hugely important determinant of tobacco use and how effective tobacco control policies are,鈥� says听,听Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Health, 91亚色 Research Chair in Global Health Equity and Director of Global Strategy Lab. 鈥淭his lack of a gender lens limits our understanding of the effectiveness of tobacco control policy interventions and fails to address gendered smoking behaviours.鈥澨�

The researchers, including Poirier, GSL Investigator and 91亚色 researcher   and GSL research assistant and 91亚色 researcher , examined 43 peer-reviewed studies on tobacco control and found that while some studies looked at basic comparisons between men and women, only five evaluated the gender-specific impacts of tobacco control policies. 

鈥淭he incorporation of gender in the peer-reviewed research is lackluster,鈥� says Nanyangwe-Moyo. 鈥淲e hope our contributions will show the importance of looking at the differences in smoking behaviours of men and women around the world in creating effective policy and smoking cessation programs.鈥澨�

While this study is the first to examine the intersection of tobacco-control and gender-based policy, it builds on existing research from the Global Strategy Lab on smoking and global policy. 

In Canada, while smoking rates are on the decline, 14.8 per cent of men and 10.2 per cent of women smoke. Globally, more than a fifth of the world鈥檚 population uses tobacco, with the World Health Organization reporting 36.7 per cent of men and 7.8 of women using tobacco products in 2020. 

Poirier says they chose to focus on cigarette smoking in their research rather than vaping as it is the most common form of tobacco use and because of its level of harm.

鈥淭here are harms associated with vaping itself, but when we look at the number one preventable cause of premature mortality and morbidity, it's combustible tobacco use,鈥� he says. 

The researchers will continue to look at gender and smoking and will be publishing several upcoming research papers on the topic. In the first, the researchers look at how much men and women smokers smoke a day across the world and examine the potential reasons behind these differences in various parts of the world.  Another will look at the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, an international agreement on smoking, and whether it has been equally effective for men and women across the world. 

鈥淭his is the start for us in opening up a new set of research on this previously mostly ignored area,鈥� says Poirier. 

GSL is hosting a discussion of how to strengthen tobacco controls globally on Thursday May 29 at 10 a.m. EDT. Details and registration information . 

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91亚色 is a modern, multi-campus, urban university located in Toronto, Ontario. Backed by a diverse group of students, faculty, staff, alumni and partners, we bring a uniquely global perspective to help solve societal challenges, drive positive change, and prepare our students for success. 91亚色's fully bilingual Glendon Campus is home to Southern Ontario's Centre of Excellence for French Language and Bilingual Postsecondary Education. 91亚色鈥檚 campuses in Costa Rica and India offer students exceptional transnational learning opportunities and innovative programs. Together, we can make things right for our communities, our planet, and our future. 

Media Contact: 

Emina Gamulin, 91亚色 Media Relations, 437-217-6362, egamulin@yorku.ca

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Population-level research suggests nearly all of us have something we could work on

TORONTO, July 04, 2023 鈥� A new long-term study of population-level data shows that when it comes to health, pretty much everyone could make improvements, plus the relationship with risk factors and mortality changes over time, sometimes in surprising ways.

鈥淵ou can take this as a good news story or a bad news story, depending on how you want to look at these numbers,鈥� says Faculty of Health Associate Professor with the School of Kinesiology and Health Science , lead author of the study. 鈥淲hat we discovered is that the relationship with risk factors and mortality changes over time, which could be explained by factors such as evolution in treatments and changes in social stigma. Overall, most of us have something wrong with us, and we鈥檙e more likely to have a lifestyle health-risk factor now than in the 鈥�80s and that鈥檚 actually associated with even greater mortality risk now than before.鈥�

The research,, took United States survey data from 1988 to 1994 and 1999 to 2014, and looked at the five-year mortality odds for people 20 or older. The research team looked at 19 different risk factors and then adjusted the data for age, sex, obesity category and ethnicity. What they found overall was that less than three per cent of people had none of the risk factors. While previous research has documented the risk factors very well, Kuk says what was less understood was the relationship between various risks and the likelihood for mortality over time. Kuk and the research team found that that relationship could sometimes be paradoxical.

For example, says Kuk, rates of smoking, long linked to conditions that can lead to death such as cancer, heart disease, stroke and diabetes, have overall decreased thanks to strong public-health campaigns. However, the overall risk of being a smoker increased over time, which Kuk says could perhaps be explained by increased stigma as the addiction became less common and awareness of risks grew, which may also be reflected in research funding.

鈥淚f you look at cancer research, there's a lot of funding overall, but specifically for lung cancer, it seems to be associated with moral fault and as a consequence lower funding,鈥� says Kuk. 鈥淲hen you look at the mortality risk associated with having lung cancer relative to all the other common cancers, it's extremely high. So I think that this lack of push is detrimental.鈥�

Kuk鈥檚 main area of research is obesity, and here she found that while the prevalence has gone up, the risks have gone down.

鈥淓ven though there's more and more people with obesity, it's actually not resulting in more deaths over time. And so I think that that's another clear thing we need to recognize, that we're very good at treating the outcomes associated with obesity. And regardless of what our body weight is, most of us have something that we can probably work on.鈥�

Some of the other health trends that Kuk found in the data include:

• Diabetes and hypertension rates have gone up over time, but risks have gone down.
• More people aren鈥檛 exercising, and this is now related to worse outcomes than it once was.
• Being on mental-health medications was not a significant risk factor in the 1980s, but in the later dataset was associated with increased mortality.
• Not finishing high school is associated with health risks, while it was not in the 1980s.

While Kuk says the research points to nearly all of us having room for improvement when it comes to various factors like diet, exercise, smoking, alcohol and drug intake, she also says that there are factors that are out of many people鈥檚 individual control.

鈥淲hen we look at things like food insecurity, low education 鈥� as a society, we're making it so that health might not be an easy choice for a lot of people. We need to be sensitive to that when we take a look at these risk factors.鈥�

of Jennifer Kuk explain the research.

About 91亚色

91亚色 is a modern, multi-campus, urban university located in Toronto, Ontario. Backed by a diverse group of students, faculty, staff, alumni and partners, we bring a uniquely global perspective to help solve societal challenges, drive positive change, and prepare our students for success. 91亚色鈥檚 fully bilingual Glendon Campus is home to Southern Ontario鈥檚 Centre of Excellence for French Language and Bilingual Postsecondary Education. 91亚色鈥檚 campuses in Costa Rica and India offer students exceptional transnational learning opportunities and innovative programs. Together, we can make things right for our communities, our planet, and our future.

Media Contacts: Emina Gamulin, 91亚色 Media Relations and External Communications, 437-217-6362, egamulin@yorku.ca

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Studies provide evidence for urgent need to tackle smoking globally, especially in low- to middle-income countries

TORONTO, June 20,听2019听鈥撎齌here is no statistical evidence that global cigarette consumption has fallen as a result of the World Health Organization鈥檚 Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, and in low- and middle-income countries it has actually increased, according to two studies led by global health researchers at 91亚色.

The studies, published in听 (BMJ), put into question the widely held belief that the FCTC has been the most successful health treaty ever created. An international treaty adopted in 2003 to reduce harmful tobacco consumption, the FCTC鈥檚 听had never been scientifically studied on a global level. The research also puts the spotlight on the urgent need not only for investment in tobacco control practices but also听an evaluation of the effectiveness of this international law and reporting practices.

鈥淭he policies promoted by this treaty听鈥撎齪lain packaging, smoke-free areas, tobacco taxes听鈥撎齢ave been monolithically proven to be effective,鈥� says Steven Hoffman,听professor in the Dahdaleh Institute for Global Health Research, Faculty of Health, and Osgoode Hall Law School, who is听lead author of the studies.

鈥淲hat this study shows is that it鈥檚 probably not enough at the global level to recognize these policies as important or to formally adopt them. We need countries to implement them to make sure they鈥檙e affecting people鈥檚 lives around the world. If not, what鈥檚 at stake, according to the WHO, is one billion people around the world might die from tobacco consumption in the 21st century.鈥�

In the first study, Hoffman and co-author听Mathieu Poirier, assistant professor, 91亚色鈥檚 Faculty of Health,听analyzed data collected from 71 countries, representing 95 percent of the world鈥檚 tobacco consumption and over 80 percent of the world鈥檚 population between the years of 1970 and 2015. The data collection is the largest appraisal and selection of comparable national estimates of tobacco consumption done to date, in an effort to better understand international cigarette consumption trends since 1970. Researchers found that cigarette consumption fell in most countries, however consumption trends varied from country to country, especially in lower-income countries.

The听听dataset looked at sales, production, imports, and exports, with up to six different sources compiled for each country per year. Researchers found a general decline in per capita cigarette consumption beginning around 1985 in five of the top ten cigarette-consuming countries: United States, Japan, Poland, Brazil, and Germany. The United States, Canada, and Australia all demonstrated similar continuous declines in consumption since the early 1980s, while Latin American and Caribbean countries experienced more modest declines. In contrast, per capita consumption rose steadily in China and Indonesia. China was found to be the world鈥檚 leading consumer of cigarettes, with over 2.5 million metric tonnes consumed in 2013 鈥� more than the next 40 highest consuming countries combined.

In the second study, Hoffman and his team used the data from the first study and looked at it in the context of the听Framework Convention on Tobacco Control which has been ratified by 181 countries since its adoption in 2003. This gave researchers a clear intervention point on tobacco consumption for the study. The study听used two听quasi-experimental methods, the first using interrupted time-series analysis (ITS) and the second using in-sample forecast event modelling. The data showed听no significant change in the rate at which global cigarette consumption had been decreasing after adoption of the treaty.

鈥淭his study sets a new gold standard for how to evaluate international laws,鈥� said co-author Poirier. 鈥淭he FCTC was widely celebrated at the time it was launched and no one has actually evaluated that treaty on a global level until now.鈥�

The research showed that after 2003, high income and European countries experienced a decrease in annual consumption by more than 1,000 cigarettes per adult, while low- and middle-income and Asian countries showed an increase of more than 500 cigarettes annually per adult.

Researchers suggest that varied implementation of tobacco control policies and shifting trends in cigarette affordability across countries may have generated market equilibrium effects that incentivized the tobacco industry to move its lobbying, marketing and promotion activities away from countries with strict guidelines and toward countries with less stringent measures.

鈥淲e found quantitative evidence that could support that idea: that tobacco companies, after the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, specifically went to jurisdictions that were not implementing proven tobacco control policies as rapidly as we saw in high income countries,鈥� said Hoffman. 鈥淚f this is true, this means the FCTC could even have unintentionally caused harm by encouraging tobacco companies to target the many more people who live in these areas and Asian countries who would have fewer governmental protections against the companies鈥� efforts.鈥�

91亚色听champions new ways of thinking that drive teaching and research excellence. Our students receive the education they need to create big ideas that make an impact on the world. Meaningful and sometimes unexpected careers result from cross-disciplinary programming, innovative course design and diverse experiential learning opportunities. 91亚色 students and graduates push limits, achieve goals and find solutions to the world鈥檚 most pressing social challenges, empowered by a strong community that opens minds. 91亚色 U is an internationally recognized research university 鈥� our 11 faculties and 25 research centres have partnerships with 200+ leading universities worldwide. Located in Toronto, 91亚色 is the third largest university in Canada, with a strong community of 53,000 students, 7,000 faculty and administrative staff, and more than 300,000 alumni. 91亚色 U's fully bilingual Glendon Campus is home to Southern Ontario's Centre of Excellence for French Language and Bilingual Postsecondary Education. 听

Media Contact:听听Anjum Nayyar, 91亚色 Media Relations, 416 736 2100 ext. 44543听anayyar@yorku.ca

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