Smoking might be a sign of psychiatric illness, so doctors should routinely consider referring people who smoke to mental health services in case they need treatment, according to a story by Jeremy Laurance for The Irish Independent quoting the British Lung Foundation (BLF).

The BLF suggestion came in response to a report, Smoking and Mental Health, published by the Royal College of Physicians and the Royal College of Psychiatrists with the Faculty of Public Health.

The report statess that almost one in three cigarettes smoked in Britain today is smoked by someone with a mental disorder. And when people with drug and alcohol problems are lumped together with those with mental disorders, the proportion is even higher.

“Smoking is increasingly becoming the domain of the most disadvantaged: the poor, homeless, imprisoned and those with mental disorder,” states the report. “This is a damning indictment of UK public health policy and clinical service provision.”