Article Text
Abstract
Background Panama has the lowest overall prevalence of tobacco use in the Americas, however rates are almost three times higher in the indigenous territory of Kuna Yala compared with the national average. Most people who smoke started during adolescence, making this a key period for tobacco control efforts.
Objective We aimed to examine tobacco access and use among adolescents (13 to 15 years old) in Kuna Yala compared with nationwide Panama using data from the 2017 Global Youth Tobacco Survey, a standardised international tool for assessing key tobacco control indicators among adolescents.
Results The prevalence of current tobacco use among 13 to 15 year olds in Kuna Yala was 14.0% (95% CI: 11.6% to 16.9%)—almost twice the national average of 7.8% (95% CI: 6.3% to 9.4%). Half of all adolescents in Kuna Yala estimated the cost of a 20-cigarette pack as less than US$0.75, compared with 16.2% of adolescents across of Panama (p value <0.01).
Conclusions Kuna Yala is one of the few indigenous territories in Spanish-speaking countries where key tobacco control indicators have recently been assessed. Higher tobacco use and lower reported cigarette prices in that region may be linked with the presence of barter economy which may give adolescents more ready access to cigarettes than in other parts of Panama. There is a need for more indigenous-specific data to help build the evidence base to improve tobacco control and reduce commercial tobacco use among indigenous peoples.
- surveillance and monitoring
- priority/special populations
- economics
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Footnotes
Contributors Conceptualisation, HQ and RR; formal analysis, HQ; investigation, HQ; data curation, HQ; writing—original draft preparation, HQ and RR; writing—review and editing, HQ and RR. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.
Funding The authors have not declared a specific grant for this research from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.
Competing interests None declared.
Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.