Smoking prevalence in the area of responsibility of the German Ministry of Defense — results of the employee survey in the context of occupational health management

BACKGROUND: Tobacco use, correlated with reduced physical fitness, is one of the leading causes of avoidable death worldwide. It increases the risk of dementia and can shorten the lifespan by 10 years. For the German Armed Forces (Bundeswehr), figures on smoking behavior have not been comprehensively captured. This study analyzes current data in a large sample from this population. METHODS: Based on an employee survey as part of the Occupational Health Management System, data on smoking behavior from 13,326 participants were analyzed in relation to age, gender, professional status, education level and membership in military operational units versus other agencies. RESULTS: Smoking behavior varied significantly (P < 0.001) by age group (younger > older), gender, professional status, military agency membership status, and education level (the lower the education level, the higher the smoking rates). With the exception of the downward trend in smoking behavior with increasing age among civilian employees, these results were all significant (P < 0.005). CONCLUSIONS: This data analysis shows that smoking prevalence among personnel in the area of responsibility of the Federal Ministry of Defense is comparable to the current data from corresponding surveys of the German population. Depending on gender, they generally show values that are slightly above those of the German population. The well-known trend in the general population of decreasing smoking prevalence with increasing age is also seen in this analysis. However, there are considerable differences in the smoking prevalence among individual subgroups (professional status, agency, gender, education level). The data show that particular young soldiers in the armed forces should be the target group for further preventive measures.