Roll-your-own tobacco use among Canadian youth: is it a bigger problem than we think?

Scott T Leatherdale,Robin Burkhalter

doi:10.1186/1471-2458-12-557

Scott T Leatherdale, Robin Burkhalter

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-12-557

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Abstract

BackgroundDespite the apparent decline in the popularity of roll-your-own (RYO) cigarettes over the past few decades, RYO tobacco products are widely available and used by a substantial number of adult smokers. Considering research has yet to examine the prevalence of RYO tobacco use among youth populations, this manuscript examines the prevalence of RYO tobacco use and factors associated with RYO use in a nationally representative sample of youth smokers from Canada.MethodsThis study used data collected from 3,630 current smokers in grades 9 to 12 as part of the 2008-09 Canadian Youth Smoking Survey (YSS). Descriptive analyses of the sample demographic characteristics, smoking status, cigarettes per day, weekly spending money, and frequency of marijuana use were examined by RYO tobacco ever use and RYO tobacco current use. Two logistic regression models were used to examine factors associated with RYO tobacco ever use and RYO tobacco current use.ResultsWe identified that 51.2% of current smokers were RYO ever users and 24.2% were RYO current users. The prevalence of RYO current users was highest in Atlantic Canada (40.1%) and lowest in Quebec (12.3%). RYO current users were more likely to be male (OR 1.27), to be daily smokers (OR 1.75), to use marijuana once a month or more (OR 2.74), and to smoke 11 or more cigarettes per day (OR 6.52). RYO current users were less likely to be in grade 11 (OR 0.65) or grade 12 (OR 0.40) and less likely to have between $20 to $100 (OR 0.44) or more than $100 (OR 0.45) of disposable income.ConclusionsDeveloping a better understanding of RYO tobacco use among youth is important for advancing population-level tobacco control prevention strategies and cessation programs. We identified that RYO tobacco use is not a negligible problem among Canadian youth. Ongoing research is needed to continue monitoring the prevalence of RYO use among youth and the factors associated with its use, but to also monitor if this more affordable tobacco product is being targeted to price sensitive youth smokers.

Highlights

Despite the apparent decline in the popularity of roll-your-own (RYO) cigarettes over the past few decades, RYO tobacco products are widely available and used by a substantial number of adult smokers
The target population consisted of all young Canadian residents attending public and private secondary schools in 10 Canadian provinces; youth residing in the Yukon, Nunavut and the Northwest Territories were excluded from the target population, as were youth living in institutions or on First Nation Reserves, and youth attending special schools or schools on military bases
We identified that RYO tobacco use is not a negligible problem among Canadian youth smokers, as almost one in four reported currently using RYO tobacco

Summary

Introduction

Despite the apparent decline in the popularity of roll-your-own (RYO) cigarettes over the past few decades, RYO tobacco products are widely available and used by a substantial number of adult smokers. Despite the apparent decline in the popularity of RYO cigarettes over the past few decades [1,2], RYO tobacco products are widely available and used by a substantial number of adult smokers [2,3,4,5] This is important as evidence suggests that smokers who use RYO tobacco compared to factory. In 2008, a smoker in Canada would have to pay $20.67(Can) of Federal tax and between $20.26-$42.00(Can) in Provincial/Territorial tax on 200 manufactured cigarettes, whereas a smoker purchasing 100 g of fine-cut loose-leaf tobacco (~200 RYO cigarettes) would have only had to pay $7.31(Can) in Federal tax and between $10.30-$33.54(Can) in Provincial/Territorial tax (11) These large discrepancies in Federal and Provincial/Territorial taxes are important as price sensitive youth may compensate for price/taxation increases by shifting from FM cigarettes to cheaper RYO cigarettes instead of quitting or reducing consumption [1]. It would be informative to build on such evidence by examining the prevalence of RYO tobacco use among Canadian youth

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