Portrayals of tobacco use in PG-13 movies more than doubled since 2010

New data from the CDC reveal that the portrayal of tobacco use in PG-13 movies — when characters are smoking cigarettes or other tobacco products — has gone up by 120% between 2010-2018. Here’s more: 

• Overall trends: Scenes and characters portraying tobacco use increased in top-grossing movies by 57% between 2010-2018. Movies released in 2015 had the fewest such portrayals during that time. 
• Movie type: Biographical movies had the most incidents portraying tobacco in 2018. Almost a third of movies rated G, PG, and PG-13 showed scenes and characters with tobacco products. 
• Production house: Disney went from having 10 incidents across its movies showing tobacco use in 2010 to none in 2018. At the same time, there was a 200% increase — from 96 to 327 — in such portrayals in Fox movies.