That’s according to new data from the Centers for Disease Control, reports CNBC. In 2017, 34.3 million adults in the U.S. smoked cigarettes–that’s 14% of adults. By contrast, 15.5% of adults smoked in 2016. The all-time low is a 67% decline in the number of people smoking since 1965, when 42.4% of the public smoked.
The CDC says that rising tobacco prices, educating the public about the dangers of smoking, and increasing efforts to help people quit are the main reasons behind the decline. However, when adding other types of tobacco products like e-cigarettes and smokeless tobacco, the number of U.S. adults who used tobacco products of some kind in 2017 raises to 19.3%, or 47 million people.
And while e-cigarettes have gotten much attention over the last few years, Brian King, a deputy director in the CDC’s office on smoking and health, says, “If e-cigarette use was responsible [for declines in cigarette use], you would expect to see a perfect correlation, but that’s not what we’re seeing. If anything, e-cigarettes have complicated the tobacco product landscape.”
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