China unable to stub out tobacco use

Efforts to curb tobacco use in the world's most populous nation have had no real impact and 301 million Chinese are still smoking, China's Centre for Disease Control has said.

A survey of more than 13,000 people earlier this year found no significant improvement in the country's smoking rate since 2002, China's CDC said in a joint statement released with the World Health Organisation.

The survey also found that 72.4 per cent of nonsmokers reported being exposed to second-hand smoke. Though China has pledged to make indoor public places, workplaces and public transport smoke-free by early next year, 63 per cent of those surveyed said they had seen people smoking in public places or at work.

"There has been no substantive improvement in the smoking rate or exposure to second-hand smoke," Yang Gonghuan, deputy director of China's CDC, said.