More middle-class and wealthy women smoke than a decade ago, bucking the national trend.
While smoking rates have decreased among working-class women, research suggests they have increased among younger, more affluent women.
Experts suggest the increases could be due to strains on female-led professions – such as teaching and nursing – as well as being less affected by price increases.
Researchers at University College London studied data from almost 200,000 adults in England who participated in the Smoking Toolkit study.
Experts believe the rise in smoking could be because women have more stressful jobs, such as nursing and teaching, but also because financial pressures are felt less, thanks to other groups.
Some 44,052 were women of reproductive age (18 to 45 years), considered among those at greatest risk of suffering the harms of smoking.
Smoking prevalence among working-class women and the unemployed fell from 28.7 percent to 22.4 percent over the decade.
But among women whose household income was highest in professional, managerial or administrative jobs, the proportion jumped from 11.7 percent to 14.9 percent.
The same was not true for men: rates remained stable over the decade, according to the study funded by Cancer Research UK and published in BMC Medicine.
Meanwhile, vaping among all women ages 18 to 45 has more than tripled in a decade, rising from 5.1 percent to 19.7 percent between 2013 and 2023.
It comes days after MPs backed Rishi Sunak’s plan to ban anyone born after 2009 from buying cigarettes, despite opposition from some Conservative MPs.
The legislation will also introduce measures designed to “crack down on youth vaping” and strengthen enforcement of vaping restrictions.
Lead author Dr Sarah Jackson, from the UCL Institute of Epidemiology and Healthcare, said the rise among this group was “concerning”.
She said: “These findings suggest that this group may benefit from a specific intervention to prevent smoking or relapse.”
“Reducing smoking is especially important among women in this age group, as smoking reduces fertility and increases the chances of pregnancy complications, miscarriages, and poor child health.”
The proportion of female smokers ages 18 to 45 who said they smoked primarily or exclusively hand-rolled cigarettes rose from 40.5 percent to 61.4 percent over the decade.
This may also have been triggered by the cost of living crisis, the researchers said, while gender inequalities were exacerbated during the pandemic.
The 2023 health report from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development showed that 12.7 per cent of Britons aged 15 and over smoke cigarettes daily, much higher than the United States and New Zealand, the latter country recently introduced a similar gradual smoking ban.
The latest figures from the ONS show that the number of people smoking cigarettes in the UK has fallen to a record low. In total, 6.4 million adults in the UK, or 12.9 per cent, smoked in 2022. This is the lowest figure since records began in 2011 and represents a fall from 13.3 per cent. percent reported in 2021.
They wrote: “These financial pressures likely contributed to the reduction in smoking prevalence among women from less advantaged social grades and encouraged those who did not quit to switch to hand-rolled products as a way of allowing themselves to continue smoking.”
Dr Sharon Cox, lead author, said: “The reasons for the possible increase in smoking among more advantaged women under 45 years of age are unclear.
‘However, it is possible that financial pressures from smoking were less influential in this group.
“Some may also have opted for cheaper hand-rolled cigarettes, a trend that was most pronounced among less advantaged female smokers, 68 percent of whom rolled their own cigarettes in 2023.”
The team said more research is needed to determine whether the increase in smoking among more affluent women is related to those who have never smoked or to former smokers who have resumed the habit.
It comes as a new report from the Royal College of Physicians (RCP) calls for tighter restrictions on youth vaping.
The study said that promotion of e-cigarettes on social media should be restricted, that e-cigarettes should be made less affordable for young people and that vaporizers would be less attractive in plain packaging.
One of the most recognizable faces in cinema, Bridget Jones, fits into this category of thirty-something journalist, often seen with a cigarette in her hand.
Said to inspire women’s health for a generation, Helen Fielding’s heroine is making a sensational return in Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy, 23 years after the original.