Changes over time in illicit cigarette use in Brazil, overall and by educational level: proposed novel approach and results
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1
Brazilian National Cancer Institute, Brazil
2
Center of Studies on Integration and Development (CINDES), Brazil
3
The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Epidemiology, United States of America
4
Brazilian National Cancer Institute, Epidemiology, Brazil
Publication date: 2018-03-01
Tob. Induc. Dis. 2018;16(Suppl 1):A505
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ABSTRACT
Background:
The strategy of raising
taxes has reduced smoking prevalence in Brazil in the last few years. However,
given the presence of illicit cigarette products in Brazil, smokers may
have migrated to cheaper illicit cigarettes in order to save money, thus
undermining efforts to further reduce smoking prevalence, mostly among
underprivileged smokers. The aim
of the present study was to
estimate the proportions of illicit cigarette consumption in Brazil from 2012 to
2016.
Methods:
We used an approach
based on legal sales provided by the Secretariat of Federal Revenues and
self-reported consumption data from a phone survey conducted annually (VIGITEL)
to estimate the changes over time in illegal cigarette use in Brazil, overall
and by educational level. For that purpose, we also used available information
on the proportion of illegal cigarette consumption from a nationwide household
survey conducted in 2013 to calculate a constant proportion of under-reporting
from VIGITEL in relation to total sales in Brazil.
Results:
There was an increase in the estimated proportion of
illicit cigarette use from 2012 to 2013 (+12.9%), then a decrease from
2013 to 2014 (-10.8%), and then a sustained trend of increase
from 2014 to 2016 (+26.7%, from 2014 to 2015; +17.3%, from 2015 to 2016).The same pattern was observed for both high and low
educational level smokers. For each year, the latter had higher baseline proportions of illegal
cigarette use.
Conclusions:
Novel and feasible approaches to estimate the
changes over time in illegal market are important to help in the effective
implementation of tobacco excise tax policy.