Last decades chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) has got particular medical and social importance by virtue of its growing spread and essential contribution to morbidity, disability and the death rate. The purpose of this work was to study the prevalence of tobacco smoking as the most aggressive COPD risk factor in various population groups at a large industrial centre. 2,304 industrial workers (males and females) of Kemerovo city were examined. The prevalence and intensity of tobacco

more »

... moking and relationship between basic smoking indexes and occupational factors, age, education, smoking of parents, living conditions, or blood group were evaluated in this research. The prevalence of the tobacco smoking among the workers questioned was 70.1 % of males and 25.7 % of females. Of the men, the absolute leaders of the tobacco smoking considering all the parameters were drivers; differences between other groups were insignificant. The greatest value of the smoking index in males was found in those of 40 to 49 and 50 to 59 years old out of proportion to their occupation, the smoking intensity in older men decreased. Attitude to smoking was provided by setting of the environmental and intrinsic factors: high educated men smoked less; probability of the smoking raised in children whose parents were smokers or ex smokers. The blood group III is thought to contribute to the smoking predisposition.