Smokers may try to quit 30 times before it sticks

Though conventional wisdom says it takes five to seven attempts for most smokers to quit, those estimates may be very low, a recent study suggests.

Based on data for more than 1,200 adult smokers in Canada, the real average number of quit attempts before succeeding may be closer to 30.

“For so long we’ve been talking about five to seven attempts to quit,” said lead author Dr. Michael Chaiton of the school of public health at the University of Toronto in Canada. “For us (the numbers) were a lot higher.”

The lower estimate comes from a few past . . .