Mansfield and Ashfield third worst in country for smoking during pregnancy

Almost a quarter of pregnant women in Mansfield and Ashfield are smokers when they give birth, shocking figures have revealed.

The figures for NHS Mansfield and Ashfield reveal 23.2 per cent of women smoking at time of delivery, making it third worst in the country.

The CCG with the highest percentage of women smoking at time of delivery is NHS North East Lincolnshire at 24.9 per cent.

The latest report of its kind, Statistics on Women’s Smoking Status at Time of Delivery, published by NHS Digital in December 2018, presents sobering facts and figures.

Generally, the report reads 10.5 per cent of pregnant women were known to be smokers at time of delivery during quarter 2 of 2018/2019. This is similar to 10.4 per cent for the previous quarter (quarter 1, 2018/19.)

The current national ambition is to achieve a level of 6 per cent or less by 2022.

Vapourcore.com analysed the NHS Digital report in greater detail to expose where in England smoking in pregnancy is currently at its worst, taking the percentage of women known to be smokers at time of delivery during quarter 2 of 2018/2019 and extracting the 10 highest percentages by Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG.)

NHS North East Lincolnshire is followed by high levels seen in NHS Blackpool (24.5 per cent).

CCGs with a lower smoking in pregnancy percentage, but still ranked in the top 10 highest of 195 CCGs, include NHS North Lincolnshire (19.5 per cent), NHS South Kent Coast (19.3 per cent) and NHS Lincolnshire East (18.8 per cent.)

In quarter 2, the CCGs with the lowest proportion of women known to be smokers at time of delivery, overall, were NHS West London (2.3 per cent), NHS Central London (Westminster) (2.6 per cent) and NHS Ealing (2.7 per cent.)

In quarter 2 of 2018/19, just 31 out of 195 clinical commissioning groups met the new national ambition of six per cent or less.