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Tracy L. Durrah, DrPH

Tracy L. Durrah is with the Department of Sociomedical Sciences, Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University, New York City.

Correspondence: Requests for reprints should be sent to Tracy L. Durrah, DrPH, Department of Sociomedical Sciences, Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University, 600 West 168th St, 4th Floor, New York, NY 10032 (e-mail: tld5{at}columbia.edu).

Objectives. I sought to determine correlates of daily smoking among recently arrested women involved in the Drug Use Forecasting Program (DUF), many of whom are illicit drug users. Also, I compared smoking rates among DUF women, who were illicit drug users, with rates among women taking part in the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) survey, who do not have high levels of drug use, to determine if drug use accounts for heavy smoking.

Methods. I compared daily smoking, illicit drug use, and selected demographic characteristics in 2 DUF cities: New York, with the highest rate of smoking among DUF cities in 1997, and Los Angeles, with the lowest. I also compared DUF and BRFSS daily smoking rates.

Results: Although rates of illicit drug use were similar in New York and Los Angeles (69.7% and 61.8%, respectively), the daily smoking rate was higher in New York (90.9% vs 41.7%). DUF smoking rates were higher than BRFSS rates; both rates were higher than the general population (23%).

Conclusions. Illicit drug use does not, in all cases, explain high rates of daily smoking. Future efforts to shape tobacco-related public health policies in New York and elsewhere should involve collaboration with criminal justice transitional health programs.

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