Letters
Indigenous health
Volume 198 - Issue 9

Changes in smoking intensity among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, 1994–2008

Author:  David P Thomas

Med J Aust 2013; 198 (9): 479. || doi: 10.5694/mja12.11839
Published online: 20 May 2013
In reply: Nowhere in my article do I promote reducing the number of cigarettes patients smoke, rather than smoking cessation, as a goal for clinicians. Mendelsohn and Gould have created their own straw man with which to argue. I explain in the third paragraph of the Discussion that the population changes in smoking intensity may have been caused by previously heavy smokers cutting down (with only ...
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In reply: Nowhere in my article do I promote reducing the number of cigarettes patients smoke, rather than smoking cessation, as a goal for clinicians. Mendelsohn and Gould have created their own straw man with which to argue.

I explain in the third paragraph of the Discussion that the population changes in smoking intensity may have been caused by previously heavy smokers cutting down (with only modest health benefits) or by younger cohorts never becoming heavy smokers (which will lead to greater health benefits).1 There are early signs of the more important latter change occurring, as has been shown in the United States with more detailed datasets.2

Mendelsohn and Gould are wrong to dismiss these changes as mere epidemiological curiosity. They are a public health achievement, probably caused by the public health measures that I described and which they acknowledge. Together with previously reported trends in smoking behaviour, these changes should lead to lower rates of sickness and early death due to smoking in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

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