Smoking habit among Bangladesh Secretariat staff

The paper assesses the smoking behaviour among the Bangladesh Secretariat Staff, Dhaka. The findings are based on interviewing 2008 respondents of whom 775 (38.6%) were reported to be smokers. Amongst the three categories of the respondents selected for interview, the prevalence of smoking was the highest (49%) for the respondents belonging to the lowest socio-economic group. The mean age at commencement of smoking was in the neighbourhood of 18 years. Majority of the smokers (76.5%) were motivated by their friends. Advertisement did not appear to have any influence of smoking. Nearly 17% were self motivated. Respondents' current age, level of education and employment status were found to have strong influence on smoking habit.