Benefits of Quitting Smoking in Japan on Working Productivity and Activity Impairment and Indirect Costs

Smoking is associated with significant health and economic burden globally, including an increased risk of many leading causes of mortality and significant impairments in work productivity. This burden is attenuated by successful tobacco cessation, including reduced risk of disease and improved productivity. Despite this proven benefit, and evidence suggesting that the initial cost of smoking cessation programs is offset by their benefits, few employers offer such programs in the workplace. Data source was the 2011 Japan National Health and Wellness Survey (N=30,000). Respondents aged 20-64 were used in the analyses (N=23,738) and were categorized into: current smokers, former smokers, and never smoked. Generalized linear models controlling for demographics and health characteristics examined the relationship of smoking status with the Work Productivity and Activity Impairment questionnaire (WPAI-GH) endpoints as well as estimated indirect costs. After controlling for covariates, there were no significant differences between never smokers and former smokers on absenteeism, presenteeism, and overall work impairment; however, former smokers had greater activity impairment than never smokers, and never smokers had greater activity impairment than current smokers. Never smokers and former smokers had lower presenteeism and overall work impairment than current smokers. Regarding costs, presenteeism costs and total (absenteeism + presenteeism) indirect costs of current smokers were higher than those of both never smokers and former smokers. There were no significant differences across groups for absenteeism costs. The current study provides important further evidence of this association, with former smokers appearing statistically indistinguishable from never smokers in terms of work productivity loss and associated indirect costs among a large representative sample of Japanese workers. Whereas longitudinal studies are needed, this report suggests the workplace may provide an ideal setting for cessation programming and would likely provide employers with cost-savings through improved worker productivity.