IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0250065.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Epidemiology of tobacco use in Qatar: Prevalence and its associated factors

Author

Listed:
  • Ahmad AlMulla
  • Ravinder Mamtani
  • Sohaila Cheema
  • Patrick Maisonneuve
  • Jamal Abdullah BaSuhai
  • Gafar Mahmoud
  • Silva Kouyoumjian

Abstract

Tobacco use is a serious public health concern as it causes various deleterious health problems. The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of tobacco use and various types of tobacco used among a population-based sample of adults 18 years and above in Qatar (residents and expatriates). The study also attempted to assess tobacco use initiation age, tobacco dependency, and to identify factors associated with current tobacco use. This 2019 cross-sectional study was conducted among governmental employees and University students in Qatar using cluster sampling methodology. Study participants completed a self-administered, country-adapted summarized version of the Global Adult Tobacco Survey. 25.2% (n = 1741; N = 6904) of the surveyed sample reported current tobacco use. 21.5% (n = 1481) smoked tobacco (cigarettes, waterpipe, medwakh and cigar) concomitant with other forms of tobacco and only 1.0% (n = 69) were using other forms of tobacco (electronic cigarettes, smokeless tobacco and heat-not-burn tobacco products) and 2.7% (n = 191) did not mention the type of tobacco products used by them. Of the 1550 tobacco users, 42.8% were cigarette smokers, 20.9% waterpipe, 3.2% medwakh (Arabic traditional pipe) and 0.7% cigar. Moreover, 1.9% reported smokeless tobacco use (sweika), 2.0% electronic cigarette use, and 0.3% heat-not-burn tobacco use. The mean age for smoking initiation was 19.7±5.3 (Qataris 18.6±4.8 and non-Qataris 20.3±5.6). Using multivariable logistic regression, significant association was observed between tobacco use and gender, nationality, age, monthly income, living with a smoker, and self-rated health. This large population-based cross-sectional survey provides the first evidence for the prevalence of different types of tobacco use including medwakh smoking among adults (Qataris and non-Qataris) 18 years and above in Qatar. This can serve as a baseline for future research studies on the topic. Based on the review of previous and current tobacco survey findings, it is evident that the prevalence of tobacco use (current) in Qatar has declined suggesting that tobacco control measures implemented by the country have been effective in reducing tobacco consumption.

Suggested Citation

  • Ahmad AlMulla & Ravinder Mamtani & Sohaila Cheema & Patrick Maisonneuve & Jamal Abdullah BaSuhai & Gafar Mahmoud & Silva Kouyoumjian, 2021. "Epidemiology of tobacco use in Qatar: Prevalence and its associated factors," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(4), pages 1-15, April.
  • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0250065
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0250065
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0250065
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0250065&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0250065?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Vasiliki Leventakou & Mohammed Al Thani & Angeliki Sofroniou & Hamza I. Butt & Safa M. Eltayeb & Iman A. Hakim & Cynthia Thomson & Uma S. Nair, 2022. "Feasibility and Acceptability of a Telephone-Based Smoking Cessation Intervention for Qatari Residents," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(24), pages 1-11, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0250065. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.