Tobacco & Vaping 101: Kentucky

Lawmakers are often bombarded with misinformation on the products used by adults in their state. This annual analysis provides up-to-date data on the adults who use cigarettes and e-cigarette products in Kentucky. This information aslo includes data on youth use, impacts of e-cigarettes and analyses of existing tobacco monies.

Key Points: 

• In 2021, 19.6 percent of adults were currently smoking in Kentucky. This is an 8.4 percent decrease from 2020.
• In 2021 (among all Kentucky adults), 13.7 percent of 18- to 24-year-olds, 23.8 percent of 25–44-year-olds, 23.3 percent of 45–64-year-olds, and 11.8 percent of adults aged 65 years or older were currently smoking combustible cigarettes.
• Among all adults earning $25,000 or less in 2021, 36.5 percent were currently smoking compared to only 12.2 percent of adults earning $50,000 or more.
• Among all smoking adults in 2021 in Kentucky, 90.9 percent were White and 9.1 percent were Black.
• Cigarette excise taxes in Kentucky disproportionately impact low income, low education persons, while failing to significantly reduce smoking rates among that class.
• The percentage of Kentucky adults earning $25,000 or less that were smoking decreased by 5.4 percent between 2018 and 2021, while the percentage of adults earning $50,000 or more that were smoking decreased by 20.6 percent during the same period.
• Among Kentuckians who did not graduate high school, smoking rates decreased by 1.1 percent, yet rates among adults with a college degree decreased by 20 percent.
• In 2021, 9.3 percent of adults reported past-month e-cigarette use, which was a 52.5 percent increase from 2017.
• Youth vaping seems to have peaked in 2019, when 20 percent of youth reported current e-cigarette use. Between 2019 and 2022, current e-cigarette use declined by 53 percent.
• Traditional tobacco use among youth is at record lows. In 2022, only 1.9 percent of U.S. youth reported current cigar use, 1.6 percent reported current combustible cigarette use and 1.3 percent reported using smokeless tobacco products.
• The introduction of e-cigarettes has not led to increases in cigarette smoking, but rather, correlates with significant declines in smoking rates among young adults.
• Between 2007 and 2018, smoking rates among Kentucky adults aged 18 to 24 years old declined by 46.5 percent. Since 2018, young adult smoking rates have decreased another 32.8 percent, with average annual declines of 5.4percent.
• Kentucky woefully underfunds programs to prevent youth use of tobacco and/or vapor products and help adults quit smoking, while simultaneously receiving millions of dollars from the pockets of the adults who smoke. In 2021, for every $1 the state received in tobacco monies, it spent less than $0.01 on tobacco control efforts.