This newsletter has been prepared by TEPAV with the purpose of regularly sharing data and information on tobacco use in Turkey. This first issue of the Monitoring Newsletter features a comparative analysis of survey results conducted by TEPAV in February 2022 and Turkey results of the Global Adult Tobacco Survey (GATS).

The exhaustive analysis on the consumption of tobacco products in Turkey is based upon the micro-data obtained through nationally representative surveys. Compared to many other data sources, national-level surveys that monitor tobacco use in various countries are carried out under varying sample conditions in different years, and therefore, there exists no current standardization among the countries. In this newsletter, the results of the survey conducted by TEPAV are used to analyze the tobacco use trends in Turkey in more detail. The survey was conducted as computer-aided telephone interviews with 2000 respondents and in 12 cities that represent the 12 NUTS-1 regionse of Turkey in February 2022, namely (İstanbul (TR1), Balıkesir (TR2), İzmir (TR3), Bursa (TR4), Ankara (TR5), Antalya (TR6), Kayseri (TR7), Samsun (TR8), Trabzon (TR9), Erzurum (TRA), Malatya (TRB), Gaziantep (TRC)).

TEPAV’s research is important and meaningful, since the most recent official data on tobacco use in Turkey are from TURKSTAT’s Turkey Health Survey (2019)1 and Global Adult Tobacco Survey (2016) and there is no official survey available since then. Considering the advantages and disadvantages of the currently available data sources, it was decided to include the GATS micro datasets in the comparison for detailed statistics on tobacco use prevalence, age at initiation, cessation trends in different demographic groups. The results of the survey that has been conducted to assess tobacco use in Turkey will be evaluated and discussed, in comparison to GATS 2012 and 2016 results.

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