Efforts to kill off smoking have ground to a halt — because the pandemic drove young people to cigarettes.

The proportion of tobacco users stalled at about 15 per cent between April 2020 and August 2022.

It marked the end of a steady decline in the habit, including a five per cent drop from 2017 to 2020.

Researchers suspect pandemic stress drove 18 to 24-year-olds to take up the habit, while causing quitters to relapse.

The slowdown puts a serious dent in hopes of making England smoke-free by 2030.

The findings are from a ¬University College London study involving 102,000 people, published in the journal BMC Medicine.

It blames “stress, upheaval and social isolation in the pandemic” for driving under-25s to smoke.

Richer people working from home were also found to be less likely to quit smoking during Covid, albeit manual workers continued to quit, possibly because they were strapped for cash.

Researcher Dr Sarah Jackson said: “This study shows we are even further off track than we thought.”