Smoking, vaping, HTP, NRT and snus in Ireland

The overall trend for prevalence of current smokers in the general population in Ireland has been downwards since 2006. 19% of the population in Ireland were current smokers in 2017, down from 29% in 2006. Smoking prevalence reduced steadily during this period, with the exception of 2006-2009 where there was a 2% increase. These data come from the Eurobarometer surveys, the most recent of which was carried out in 2017. In the most recent survey a total of 27,901 respondents from different social and demographic groups were interviewed face-to-face at home, in their mother tongue, across all 28 of the EU countries. The sample for each country is representative, however the sample sizes are relatively small (e.g. most countries had just over 1000 participants, but for Italy, Malta and Lithuania the sample was around 500). Nevertheless, the Eurobarometer surveys are useful as they have estimates for smoking prevalence collected over a number of years which can show trends, as described here.