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The 10 Countries Where the Most Adults Still Use Tobacco |
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The World Health Organization’s latest tobacco report counts 1.2 billion users, one adult in five. Use is falling in most of the 166 countries it tracks. Timor-Leste tops the list at 48.8%. In 2000 it ranked 17th. It held still while the rest of the list quit. |
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Source: WHO Global Report on Trends in Prevalence of Tobacco Use 2000–2024 (released Oct 6, 2025). Age-standardized current tobacco use, adults 15+, 2024. |
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Timor-Leste has barely changed. WHO puts adult tobacco use there at 46.9% in 2000 and 48.8% in 2024. Three in four Timorese men use tobacco. That is 76.2%, the highest male rate on Earth. The country reached No. 1 by standing still. The three leaders of 2000 all fell hard. Kiribati went from 68.0% to 37.7%. Nauru went from 66.1% to 34.8% and dropped to 13th. Myanmar went from 65.5% to 43.4%. India, seventh in 2000 at 55.7%, is at 22.6% today. Timor-Leste did not take the lead. It was handed it. Lebanon went the other way. It ranked 63rd in 2000, at 34.3%. Today it is 2nd, at 46.9%. Since 2010 its rate has climbed 8.0 points, more than any other country WHO tracks. Lebanese women use tobacco at 39.7%, the third-highest female rate in the world. |
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The Balkans have barely moved. Serbia, North Macedonia, Bulgaria and Montenegro hold four of the top ten spots. Bosnia and Herzegovina is 11th. Serbia was at 41.8% in 2000. It is at 39.7% now. North Macedonia has stayed within two points of 40% the whole time. Europe is the highest-tobacco region in the world, at 24.1% of adults. Serbia also holds a rare record. Serbian women (40.2%) use more tobacco than Serbian men (39.2%). Only Nauru and Andorra share that pattern. Meanwhile, the rich English-speaking world quit. The United States fell from 38.6% to 15.8%. The United Kingdom is at 12.8%. The world fell from 33.1% to 19.5% over the same 24 years. France is the Western exception: 33.6%, almost exactly where it was in 2000. |
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76.2% Share of men in Timor-Leste who use tobacco, the highest male rate WHO records anywhere. Timorese women: 21.4%. |
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1.2 billion Tobacco users worldwide in 2024, down from 1.38 billion in 2000. The share fell faster than the headcount because the population grew. |
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3 of 166 Countries where women use more tobacco than men: Serbia, Nauru and Andorra. Worldwide, the male rate is five times the female rate. |
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8.0 points Lebanon’s rise since 2010, from 38.9% to 46.9%. No other country WHO tracks rose by more than four points. |
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29x Chinese men use tobacco at 44.2%. Chinese women: 1.5%. That is about 29 times the rate. |
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WHO projects Lebanon at 50.9% by 2030 and Timor-Leste at 49.7%. On that path, Lebanon takes the top spot and becomes the only country in the table where more than half of adults use tobacco. These are modelled estimates with wide error bands: Timor-Leste’s runs from 37% to 60%. The world also missed WHO’s 2025 goal of a 30% cut from 2010. It managed 27%. We’ll be watching. |
