The number of adult smokers has gone down even though smoking has increased among 15-year-olds, health officials highlighted yesterday.

While in 2002, 23.3 per cent of adults said they smoked, the figure was down to 20.3 by 2008, results from a Health Interview Survey show.

By contrast, in 2002 38.8 per cent of Maltese 15-year-olds said they smoked but by 2006 the incidence had gone up to 42.8 per cent, according to figures from an EU school health survey.

Malta yesterday joined the rest of the EU in an anti-smoking campaign called Help 2009-2010, For a Life Without Tobacco, targeting young people with a stop-smoking message and urging them not to start the habit in the first place.

Speaking during the launch of the campaign, Health Promotion Director Charmaine Gauci said that 103 men and 23 women died of lung cancer in 2007.

She said she hoped to see a drop in the incidence of teenage smoking in the forthcoming school health survey next year after a very strong EU and local campaign.

By their habit, smokers aggravated certain medical conditions such as bronchitis, emphysema and cardiac disease.

Medical research also showed that smokers with swine flu suffered from more complications than non-smokers, Dr Gauci said.

Smokers and the related medical conditions were an added expense to the country's healthcare system, Health Parliamentary Secretary Joe Cassar pointed out.

In fact, one in four people smoked in Malta, which meant that around 300,000 people were suffering because of passive smoking, he added.