China unlikely to triple tax on tobacco to reduce number of smoker deaths
Vested interests work against Beijing taking up study finding that higher levy saves lives
The Chinese government is unlikely to act on a UK study that proposes trebling tobacco tax globally to reduce smokers by a third, experts say.
Although the government recently showed interest in controlling smoking by banning officials from exercising the habit in public areas, Chinese experts on tobacco control say it owns the country's tobacco industry, whose interests and profits were well protected.
The researchers said China had a responsibility to address the global smoking issue.
"Cigarette consumption in China continues to rise steeply and now accounts for more than 2 trillion of a worldwide total of about 6 trillion cigarettes smoked per year," they wrote in the paper.
"Tobacco already accounts for about 12 to 25 per cent of deaths among men in low- and middle-income countries such as China. A low reliance on specific excise taxes on tobacco by China ... discourages smoking cessation."
In the paper, published in the New England Journal of Medicine yesterday, researchers from Cancer Research UK said the tax hike, although dramatic, would encourage people to quit.