Abstract

National Health Survey 2004 reported the prevalence of active smokers aged 10 years and above was 30%. In 2004, among other countries in the world, Indonesia ranked the 5th highest in tobacco consumption. Cigarette smoke produces lung carcinogens, which in America causes 3000 deaths yearly due to lung cancer to adults who are non-smokers. About 300,000 children who are passive smokers inflict a lower respiration infection such as bronchitis and peneumonia, and±1,000,000 asthma sufferers are inflicting an increase in episodes and worsening of symptoms. Damage mucosa of the lungs caused by smoking causes the smokers to easily get infections such as TB. Pharmacists can be as health educators, who are directly in contact with patients, are in unique position to give support and as motivators for patients to stop smoking.This research aimed to provide a description about pharmacists (smoking/non-smoking), their opinions and knowledge about smoking, drugs that help stop smoking and their role in helping patients stop smoking. As an instrument for collecting data, questionnaires were used by pharmacists in 6 (six) big cities namely Jakarta, Solo, Surabaya, Medan, and Makassar. Over 711 pharmacists become respondents consisting of 271 (33. 75%) men and 440 (66.25%), women. Pharmacists who smoked were 21.7% all were males. And 10.5% tried to seriously quit smoking. Pharmacists who did not smoke in the last 6 months were 12.2% and 9.5% were still smoking. Almost 93% pharmacies did not provide an area for smoking and only 7% provided it. Some reasons why pharmacists did not completely quit smoking were that they did not want to quit, environmental reasons and also it's not a process in which you can just suddenly stop and it needs motivation.Key words: smoking, tobacco. nicotine. lung carcinogen. pharmacists