World No Tobacco Day 2022: Hong Kong’s carrot-and-stick approach to smoking working – fewer than one in 10 residents now smoke
- The number of smokers in Hong Kong fell to fewer than one in 10 of the population for the first time in 2021
- With free nicotine replacement therapy and TCM treatments, and higher taxes on cigarettes, the target of having only 7.8 per cent smoke may be reached by 2025
Hong Kong’s ban on the import and sale of alternative smoking products, including vaping and heat-not-burn products, took effect on April 30 – a month before World No Tobacco Day on May 31.
Hong Kong has a target to bring the number of smokers down to 7.8 per cent of the population by 2025, and a goal of lowering that number to 5 per cent.
The percentage of residents who smoked fell to 9.5 per cent in 2021, down from 10.2 per cent in 2019, a government household survey from August showed. This is the first time the smoking prevalence rate has fallen below double digits.
The dip in the number of smokers coincides with new highs for Hongkongers’ average life expectancy at birth. In 2020, it was 82.7 years for men and 88.1 years for women.
A study, published in The Lancet Public Health journal in November and conducted by seven universities, including the University of Hong Kong. analysed 263 million deaths in 18 high-income countries, including 40 years of life expectancy data from Hong Kong, dating from 1960.
