Stop smoking campaigners have highlighted figures which suggest that smoking causes a billion pound hit to the North East economy each year.
Analysis produced by the Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) group has found the habit has a cost of around £992.5m in our region. That's made up from assessments of the impact on the NHS, on productivity, on social care and on the costs of fire and relates to the area between the Scottish borders and Teesside.
In response, campaigners and NHS bosses are calling for more to be done to reduce smoking levels, with Samantha Allen, chief executive of the NHS's North East and North Cumbria Integrated Care System, among those to call for tobacco companies to pay a levy to back smoking reduction work.
