China will soon join Singapore, Canada and Thailand as countries with those horrifying pictures on their cigarette boxes. China’s Center for Disease Control has just written new laws mandating that, by 2009, tobacco companies cover over 30% of each box with photos of skulls, rotting teeth, black lungs or men hooked up to IVs, who we can only assume are dying from lung cancer. Every time I hear of a new initiative on behalf of China’s central government to curb smoking, I always wonder the same thing: why don’t they just print up about a million “no smoking” signs, put them up in certain places and try and make China not so damn smoker-friendly. Because currently, you can smoke wherever you want in mainland China. And that means restaurants, elevators, office buildings and even hospitals. A Reuters story Tuesday claimed that there are parts of China where the average age people start smoking is ten. In a couple years, when cigarette packs have scary pictures on them, my guess is that Chinese people will find it amusing rather than be spooked. In Thailand, the country with the most graphic warnings (photo), the labels actually encouraged me to buy cigarettes as I wanted to find new grotesque boxes that I’d never seen before. My favorite was the one of the man holding his child blowing smoke into the kid’s face. It seemed more apropos of a campaign targeting stupidity than one for smoking. And to be frank, China might not be the right place to use a decayed set of teeth to make a point. If you know what I mean.

•Reuters: China Cigarette Packs to Get Skull Warnings

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