What quitting methods are Canadian smokers trying? And how successful are they?
Statistics Canada has provided new data to help answer these questions. The 2023 and 2024 waves of the Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS) included questions on the quit methods used over the past 12 months by smokers whose quit attempts failed and by those who had quit and relapsed in the same time period.
These results have not yet been published on government web-sites, but they are included in the Data Dictionaries which Statistics Canada makes available and which can be downloaded here (CCHS 2023 and CCHS 2024). (See below for more information on the survey)
The survey revealed that:
- One-half of Canadian smokers have made an unsuccessful quit attempt in the past year.
- Two-thirds of those who try to quit do so without using any cessation aids or methods
- The vast majority of quit attempts are unsuccessful (85%)
- Failure rates are essentially the same for most popular products and methods (going it alone, NRT, vaping products). Cutting down may be associated with greater chance of failure.
- Only a small number of smokers use the nicotine pouch or internet programs in their quit attempts, and the survey was unable to find a single individual who had done so successfully.
Each person who said they had smoked in the last month was asked "In the past 12 months, did you stop smoking for at least 24 hours because you were trying to cut back or quit?" About one-half said they did. Of the estimated 3.56 million Canadian smokers in 2023, 1.8 million had made a quit attempt in the previous 12 months (51%). Of the estimated 3.61 million smokers last year, 1.9 million had tried to quit at least once (54%).
As evidenced by the fact that this question was only asked of people who were smoking at the time of the interview, these attempts were unsuccessful.
Successful quit attempts were identified elsewhere in the survey. Those who were identified as having smoked in the past were asked how long ago they had quit. An estimated 429,500 had quit smoking in the past 12 months in 2023 and 414,500 in 2024.
Most quit attempts (63%) are made without any aids or methods
The CCHS asked about the stop smoking methods used both by smokers who had tried and failed to quit and those who had stopped smoking in the past 12 months.
Eight potential quitting methods were identified in 2023. These were: (a) nicotine replacement products, (b) smoking cessation medications, (c) internet-based programs or apps, (d) vaping devices or e-cigarettes, (e) making a deal with a friend or your family, (f) reducing the number of cigarettes, (g) trying to quit smoking on your own, or (h) an ‘other’ method. People could identify the use of more than one method. An additional method (tobacco-free nicotine pouches) was added to the questionnaire in 2024. These nicotine products were authorized for sale in Canada in the summer of 2023, and were widely available throughout 2024.
The yearly average of these responses is shown below (results for each survey year are provided in the downloadable data sheet).
The most commonly used commercial stop smoking aids (NRT or vaping products) were used by one-third of those making a past-year quit attempts. Smoking cessation medications and "other" unspecified methods were used by one-tenth of such respondents, and other products and services (pouches and internet apps) were used by one-twentieth.
No matter the method or product, the vast majority of quit attempts fail.
This survey is not designed to assess whether a quit attempt has been successful, and the results cannot be converted into a measure of quitting success. The CCHS relies on self-reported behaviour data, and does not confirm responses with physical or biological tests. There is no ability to test for 3-month or 6-month abstinence: those who are identified as recently-quit former smokers would include individuals who had their last cigarette only a few days ago and those for whom up to a year had passed.
The survey can, however, assess whether quit attempts have been unsuccessful. Those who report smoking and who also report having tried to quit have more obviously failed in their quit attempt (even though they may have succeeded for a length of time during the past year).
Using "Failure rate" to mean the proportion of smokers who have made a quit attempt in the past 12 months who say they are still smoking, all of the methods explored failed at least 8 times out of 10. Overall, 85% of quit attempts result in failure (continued or relapsed smoking at the time of the survey).
Vaping products yield little or no improvement over traditional methods (but carry higher risks)
At the population-level, the use of e-cigarettes is not associated with much of a difference in the outcome of a quit attempt in comparison with just going it alone or using conventional NRT. The aggregate failure rate for these three methods differ by only a percentage point. More than four in five quit attempts using a vaping product did not lead to success. In comparison with quitting on your own and traditional NRT, adverse outcomes from failed and successful attempts with vaping products include the increased harm from dual use or long-term vaping.
The survey results suggest the failure rate for those who try cutting down the number of cigarettes they smoke is about ten percentage points higher than for traditional NRT or going it alone. Cutting down is a method still promoted by the Ontario government, Health Canada and others.
Access to the Master File or PUMF file is needed to establish whether these differences are statistically significant and how the use of more than one quit method affects the outcome of an attempt.
No-one was identified as having successfully quit using nicotine pouches or stop smoking apps.
Of the approximately 50,000 Canadians participating in the survey each year, Statistics Canada identified about 650 individuals who had quit smoking in the past year and 3,050 individuals who had made an unsuccessful quit attempt (were smoking at the time of survey).
In 2024, 150 individuals reported they had used a nicotine pouch in an unsuccessful quit attempt, giving an estimate of 107,500 smokers having this experience across the country. The surveyors were unable to find even one individual who had used these products and was not smoking (Of the 650 asked, 400 respondents said "no" and 250 did not reply).
A similar result was found with respect to internet-based programs. 100 of 3,050 failed quit attempts involved the use of an app (giving an estimate of 60,000 Canadians), as did 0 of 650 successful attempts.
The Canadian Community Health Survey
The Canadian Community Health Survey is Statistics Canada’s largest national survey collecting information related to health status. The survey began in 2001 and has been conducted annually since 2007. In 2023 and 2024 the survey was restricted to individuals 18 years of age or over. The number of respondents in each of those years was 51,600 and 48,300, respectively.
Statistics Canada publishes some results from the survey in a number of tables. Examples include Health indicators by visible minority and selected sociodemographic characteristics; Health characteristics, two-year period estimates. The survey estimates that there were 3.56 million Canadians over the age of 18 who had smoked at least once in the past month in 2023 and 3.61 million in 2024.
The Data Dictionaries provide aggregated results, and do not reveal differences by age, sex, income, mental health or other important determinants of smoking behaviour. Nor do they allow for statistical tests to compare associations. Such analyses can only be done using either the CCHS Master Files, which are available to researchers based in government or universities, or the public use PUMF files which are typically not released for several years after survey completion.
