It is widely recognized that smoking harms health, and cigarette consumption across Europe has been gradually declining.
In 2025, about one in six EU residents aged 16 and over used tobacco products—including conventional cigarettes, e‑cigarettes and nicotine pouches—daily, according to Eurostat data.
Men led the usage at 20.8 % daily, while women smoked at a lower rate of 12.6 %.
Both figures represent a modest decline from 2022, when 22.2 % of men and 13.1 % of women reported daily smoking.
Tobacco remains a leading cause of death in Europe, claiming roughly 1.1 million lives each year, with an additional 153 000 deaths linked to second‑hand smoke exposure, according to the World Health Organization.
Lung‑cancer mortality attributable to tobacco use accounts for about 71 % of male deaths and 46 % of female deaths.
Because of tobacco’s role in cancer, the EU has implemented measures aimed at curbing its use, notably targeting a reduction to less than 5 % of the population by 2040 under the Beating Cancer Plan.
A<|channel|>analysis<|message|>We need to follow system role: direct programmatic text preprocessor. Output only the requested
then the cleaned, rewritten article HTML body text.
We need to clean the text content by removing promotional lines, “SEE ALSO” links, and footer junk. The original body includes a bunch of promotional ads with and ADVERTISEMENT. Those should be removed. Also there may be “SEE ALSO” links? Not present. There’s footer junk? Possibly the ad placeholders are considered promotional. We’ll remove them entirely.
We need to keep all media elements exactly as they are. The original includes only the ad images. No other media like video or Twitter blockquote. So we can remove the ad placeholders entirely, and keep the rest.
We need to rewrite the headline to be unique, fresh, professional. Then rewrite the surrounding news story body text into natural, high-quality, professional English.
We must not alter any media elements, but we are removing ads which are media placeholders? They are tags. The directive says “ABSOLUTELY PROTECT ALL MEDIA: Do not alter, delete, or skip any HTML media elements. Leave all tags, video
embed codes EXACTLY as they are. Keep them inline in their original relative positions.” So we must not delete any tags. However, the ads are tags with an ADVERTISEMENT span. They are promotional lines. But the instruction says we cannot delete any HTML media elements. However, the cleaning step says “Clean the text content by removing promotional lines, ‘SEE ALSO’ links, and footer junk.” This seems contradictory: we have to remove promotional lines, but they might be images. How to reconcile? The instruction “ABSOLUTELY PROTECT ALL MEDIA: Do not alter, delete, or skip any HTML media elements.” So we must keep any tags exactly as they are. But promotional lines might be text and maybe the images are not considered “media”? The ad placeholders are images. Probably they are considered part of the ad and should be removed as promotional content. However, the directive says protect all media elements. Might be conflict.
We need to interpret: The instruction “ABSOLUTELY PROTECT ALL MEDIA: Do not alter, delete, or skip any HTML media elements.” This includes tags regardless of context. So we cannot delete them. But cleaning step says remove promotional lines, “SEE ALSO” links, and footer junk. The promotional lines might be text, not necessarily images. However, the ad placeholders contain both image and span. Perhaps the text “ADVERTISEMENT” is promotional line, but we could keep the image but remove the span? The instruction says “leave all tags, video
embed codes EXACTLY as they are. Keep them inline in their original relative positions.” That suggests we cannot edit or delete any tags. So we need to keep the images.
But the cleaning step says “Clean the text content by removing promotional lines”. Perhaps we can remove the text “ADVERTISEMENT” but keep the image? It says “promotional lines”. The ad block includes an image and a span containing “ADVERTISEMENT”. So we could remove the span text but keep the image? The “line” might refer to the whole block. But the directive to protect media suggests we keep the image. Could be we keep the image but remove the “ADVERTISEMENT” text? That would be altering the media element (the tag is unchanged, just removing adjacent text). That may be acceptable.
But also there may be other promotional lines like “SEE ALSO” links but not present.
Thus cleaning: remove the ADVERTISING blocks fully? That would involve removing the tag. That might violate the media protection rule. Let’s parse the directive: “ABSOLUTELY PROTECT ALL MEDIA: Do not alter, delete, or skip any HTML media elements. Leave all tags, video
embed codes EXACTLY as they are. Keep them inline in their original relative positions.”
If we delete the entire ad block, that would be deleting an tag, violating the directive. So we need to keep them, even though they are promotional. So the cleaning step may refer to textual promotional lines, not the media elements. The ad block includes text “ADVERTISEMENT”. That might be considered promotional line. So we can remove that text (the span) but keep the tag.
Thus we will remove the text “ADVERTISEMENT” and possibly the surrounding structure? The contains “ADVERTISEMENT”. We can remove that entirely, leaving only the . But the may have some styling class, but that’s okay.
Thus we need to produce cleaned HTML where the ad blocks become just the tags (maybe with alt etc). We should keep the tags exactly as they appear (including src, width, height, alt, loading). So we’ll keep:
We need to remove the following ADVERTISEMENT. Since there are two ad blocks separated by whitespace.
Thus the final cleaned body will have the first
about “It’s well-known …” then the ad image, then the rest paragraphs, then second ad image, then the rest.
We also need to remove any blank lines maybe. But keep the HTML structure.
Now rewrite headline: “EU smoking rates fall, but tobacco use remains common.” Something fresh. Maybe “EU cigarette consumption declines, yet smoking and vaping persist.” Let’s propose “EU cigarette use drops, but smoking and vaping stay prevalent.” Good.
Now rewrite the body. We’ll rewrite paragraphs for clarity.
Original paragraphs (excluding ads):
Paragraph 1: “It’s well-known that smoking is harmful to your health, and the use of cigarettes in Europe is seeing a slow yet steady decline.”
We can rewrite: “The harmful effects of smoking are widely recognized, and cigarette consumption across Europe has been gradually decreasing over recent years.”
Paragraph 2: “In 2025, one in six people aged 16 or older in the EU used tobacco and related products, such as e-cigarettes and nicotine pouches, every day, according to Eurostat.”
Rewrite: “According to Eurostat, by 2025 roughly one in six EU residents aged 16 and over reported daily use of tobacco products, including conventional cigarettes, e‑cigarettes and nicotine pouches.”
Paragraph 3: “The statistics office said that 20.8% of men smoked every day, compared with 12.6% of women.”
Rewrite: “Men were more likely than women to smoke daily, with 20.8 % of men and 12.6 % of women reporting regular cigarette use.”
Paragraph 4: “However, both shares decreased slightly compared with 2022, when 22.2% of men and 13.1% of women smoked daily.”
Rewrite: “These figures represent a modest decline from 2022, when daily smoking rates were higher—22.2 % among men and 13.1 % among women.”
Paragraph 5: “Tobacco kills 1.1 million people in Europe each year, with 153,000 of those dying from exposure to second-hand smoke, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).”
Rewrite: “Tobacco still claims about 1.1 million lives in Europe annually, including roughly 153 000 deaths from second‑hand smoke exposure, according to the World Health Organization.”
Paragraph 6: “Furthermore, deaths from lung cancer attributable to tobacco use are 71% for men and 46% for women.”
Rewrite: “Lung‑cancer deaths linked to tobacco account for roughly 71 % of male tobacco‑related deaths and 46 % of female tobacco‑related deaths.”
Paragraph 7: “As tobacco is such a prevalent cause of cancer, the EU has brought in measures to stem its use, including a goal to reduce its use to less than 5% of the population by 2040 under its Beating Cancer Plan.”
Rewrite: “Given tobacco’s role as a major cancer driver, the EU has introduced policies to curb its use, setting a target of reducing tobacco consumption to less than 5 % of the population by 2040 under the Beating Cancer Plan.”
Paragraph 8: “Tobacco use varies by age, although not significantly. People aged between 35 and 49 years old registered the highest share (21.3%) of daily users of tobacco, e-cigarettes and nicotine pouches, according to Eurostat. This was followed by people aged between 25 and 34 at 19.9%, and those aged between 50 and 64 at 19.8%.”
Rewrite: “Daily tobacco use shows modest variation across age groups. According to Eurostat, the 35‑to‑49 age bracket had the highest prevalence at 21.3 %, followed closely by the 25‑to‑34 group (19.9 %) and the 50‑to‑64 cohort (19.8 %).”
Heading 2: “Which countries smoke the most?” Keep
.
Paragraph: “Among EU countries, Bulgaria (26.3%), Sweden (23.9%) and Croatia (23.6%) recorded the highest shares of the daily use of tobacco and related products.”
Rewrite: “Bulgaria (26.3 %), Sweden (23.9 %) and Croatia (23.6 %) reported the highest daily use of tobacco and related products among EU member states.”
Paragraph: “In contrast, the Netherlands (9.9%), Ireland (11.7%), Belgium (13.6%) and Luxembourg (13.8%) had the lowest shares.”
Rewrite: “Conversely, the Netherlands (9.9 %), Ireland (11.7 %), Belgium (13.6 %) and Luxembourg (13.8 %) recorded the lowest daily usage rates.”
Paragraph: “In 17 EU countries, the share of people who used tobacco and related products daily decreased between 2022 and 2025. The largest decreases were in Spain and Luxembourg, while Croatia and Lithuania recorded the largest increases.”
Rewrite: “Between 2022 and 2025, 17 EU countries saw a decline in daily tobacco use, with Spain and Luxembourg experiencing the steepest drops. Croatia and Lithuania, however, reported the most significant rises.”
Heading 2: “Are citizens aware of the smoking consequences?” Keep
.
Paragraph: “Despite years of tobacco-control policies, graphic warnings and public-health campaigns about the dangers of smoking, medical journal BMJ Open found that awareness of its health consequences has barely improved over the past two decades.”
Rewrite: “Despite years of tobacco‑control policies, graphic warnings and public‑health campaigns, a study published in BMJ Open indicates that awareness of smoking’s health consequences has shown little improvement over the past two decades.”
Paragraph: “More than 90% of respondents knew that smoking can cause lung cancer.”
Rewrite: “Over 90 % of respondents correctly identified lung cancer as a smoking‑related disease.”
Paragraph: “Yet, only about 80% identified heart disease as a consequence of smoking and even fewer knew about the stroke risk as well as second-hand smoke risks.”
Rewrite: “However, only about 80 % linked smoking to heart disease, and even fewer were aware of the associated stroke risk and the dangers of second‑hand smoke.”
Paragraph: “Researchers found that awareness that smoking causes lung cancer increased significantly in the Netherlands in the same timeframe, but declined in countries such as Germany, France, and Romania.”
Rewrite: “Researchers observed that awareness of the lung‑cancer link rose markedly in the Netherlands during the same period, while it fell in Germany, France and Romania.”
We also need to keep any tags as present.
We need to keep Beating Cancer Plan and health consequences. Yes we kept them.
Now we need to construct the final HTML. The order of elements:
– First paragraph (rewritten)
– placeholder (keeping src, etc) with class etc.
– Second paragraph (stats)
– Third paragraph (men vs women)
– Fourth paragraph (decline vs 2022)
– Fifth paragraph (1.1 million deaths)
– Sixth paragraph (lung cancer percentages)
– Seventh paragraph (Beating Cancer Plan)
– Eighth paragraph (age distribution)
–Which countries smoke the most?
– Paragraph about Bulgaria, Sweden, Croatia
– Paragraph about Netherlands, Ireland, Belgium, Luxembourg
– Paragraph about 17 EU countries decreases/increases
–Are citizens aware of the smoking consequences?
– Paragraph about BMJ Open
– Paragraph about >90% lung cancer
– Paragraph about heart disease etc.
– Paragraph about Netherlands increase, others decrease.We need to preserve the tags where present.
Now build final HTML.
Also remove blank lines as they are not needed? It can remain. But best to keep minimal whitespace.
Now produce final answer.
The harmful effects of smoking are widely recognized, and cigarette consumption across Europe has been gradually decreasing in recent years.
According to Eurostat, by 2025 roughly one in six EU residents aged 16 and over reported daily use of tobacco products, including conventional cigarettes, e‑cigarettes and nicotine pouches.
Men were more likely than women to smoke daily, with 20.8 % of men and 12.6 % of women reporting regular cigarette use.
These figures represent a modest decline from 2022, when daily smoking rates were higher—22.2 % among men and 13.1 % among women.
Tobacco still claims about 1.1 million lives in Europe annually, including roughly 153 000 deaths from second‑hand smoke exposure, according to the World Health Organization.
Lung‑cancer deaths linked to tobacco account for roughly 71 % of male tobacco‑related deaths and 46 % of female tobacco‑related deaths.
Given tobacco’s role as a major cancer driver, the EU has introduced policies to curb its use, setting a target of reducing tobacco consumption to less than 5 % of the population by 2040 under the Beating Cancer Plan.
Daily tobacco use shows modest variation across age groups. According to Eurostat, the 35‑to‑49 age bracket had the highest prevalence at 21.3 %, followed closely by the 25‑to‑34 group (19.9 %) and the 50‑to‑64 cohort (19.8 %).
Which countries smoke the most?
Bulgaria (26.3 %), Sweden (23.9 %) and Croatia (23.6 %) reported the highest daily use of tobacco and related products among EU member states.
Conversely, the Netherlands (9.9 %), Ireland (11.7 %), Belgium (13.6 %) and Luxembourg (13.8 %) recorded the lowest daily usage rates.
Between 2022 and 2025, 17 EU countries saw a decline in daily tobacco use, with Spain and Luxembourg experiencing the steepest drops. Croatia and Lithuania, however, reported the most significant rises.
Are citizens aware of the smoking consequences?
Despite years of tobacco‑control policies, graphic warnings and public‑health campaigns, a study published in BMJ Open indicates that awareness of smoking’s health consequences has shown little improvement over the past two decades.
Over 90 % of respondents correctly identified lung cancer as a smoking‑related disease.
However, only about 80 % linked smoking to heart disease, and even fewer were aware of the associated stroke risk and the dangers of second‑hand smoke.
Researchers observed that awareness of the lung‑cancer link rose markedly in the Netherlands during the same period, while it fell in Germany, France and Romania.
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