Tobacco use: maternal smoking by age group

Information on smoking behaviour in pregnancy is collected as part of ISD Scotland's SMR02 data scheme. The information presented here refers to smoking history recorded when a women books her first antenatal appointment.

Concerns have been raised about the completeness and quality of the SMR02 data, particularly in relation to the number / percentage of pregnant women whose smoking status is recorded as "not known". Some of these women may, in fact, be smokers. As such, the percentage recorded as current smokers may underestimate the true smoking prevalence among pregnant women. Care should therefore be taken when interpreting these data.

In Scotland in 2011, 11,024 pregnant women were recorded as smoking (19.3% of all those booking). Chart 1 (view chart)
 Close  shows the pattern by age group. It can be seen that a higher percentage were recorded as smoking during pregnancy in the younger age groups. The high percentage among the under 20s (40%) is particularly striking. This may be partly due to teenage pregnancies being more common in disadvantaged areas where smoking rates are highest.