Busan Citizens' Smoking and Drinking Slightly Decreased ... Regional Community Health Survey Announcement

A view of Busan City Hall. Busan City released the results of the Community Health Survey conducted last year on the 22nd.

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters, Reporter Kim Yong-woo] What is the quality of health among adult citizens of Busan? Busan City has announced the results of the ‘2019 Community Health Survey’ conducted last year.

The Community Health Survey is a regional health survey conducted annually from August to October on 900 adults aged 19 and over nationwide, in accordance with the ‘Regional Health Act.’ This survey covered about 230,000 people nationwide and 14,510 people in the Busan area.

According to the main results, the smoking rate decreased by 2.1 percentage points from the previous year to 19%, indicating a slight reduction in the smoking population. Busan citizens’ smoking rate remained 4th among metropolitan local governments nationwide. The male smoking rate was also found to have decreased by 3.9 percentage points from the previous year to 35.2%.

Regarding drinking, the monthly drinking rate was 61.9%, the overall high-risk drinking rate was 13.7%, and the high-risk drinking rate among annual drinkers was 17.5%, showing decreases of 2.1, 3.5, and 3.7 percentage points respectively, indicating considerable improvement.

In the obesity category, the actual measured obesity rate, defined as the proportion of people with a body mass index of 25 or higher, slightly increased by 0.9 percentage points from the previous year to 32.3%.

In the physical activity sector, the walking practice rate decreased by 6 percentage points from the previous year, indicating that the amount of walking among citizens slightly declined. Additionally, the health behavior practice rate, which is the proportion of adults aged 19 and over who practice all three behaviors of smoking cessation, moderate drinking, and walking, decreased by 3.0 percentage points.

In the dietary section, the proportion of the population preventing breakfast skipping was 54.8%, down 9.2 percentage points from the previous year. In the mental health area, the stress perception rate slightly improved, decreasing by 0.7 percentage points to 23.7%, and the experience rate of depression also improved slightly, decreasing by 0.5 percentage points.

Overall, indicators that improved considering the quality of health include current smoking rate, male current smoking rate, indoor workplace secondhand smoke exposure rate among current non-smokers, monthly drinking rate, overall high-risk drinking rate, high-risk drinking rate among annual drinkers, breakfast skipping prevention rate, nutrition label comprehension rate, stress perception rate, depression experience rate, post-lunch tooth brushing practice rate, complaint rate of chewing discomfort, blood pressure awareness rate, blood sugar awareness rate, and driver’s seat seatbelt wearing rate.

A Busan city official stated, “Based on these survey results, we will revise and supplement health promotion and regional health care plans to improve underperforming indicators.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.