They had absolutely ridiculous rates of smoking until recently, still very high in older men; low public awareness of the harms of smoking (see that paper I linked) and until recently low rates of education; and high public approval of smoking.

Do you believe governments should force people to not do things they want to do? Or that governments should let people do what they want and promote education and safety?

Like are you saying they should be more authoritarian about it? They should let private companies operate peddling an addictive drug like most developed nations? They should use price signals to trap people in poverty for the crime of being addicted? They should ban it and create a black market and public resentment?

what do people actually want?

They monopolised it to prevent western companies profiting (the companies that got everyone addicted in the first place and suppressed findings of harm), ran education campaigns and banned it in healthcare settings starting back in like 2006. As opinion has shifted with increasing education it's been more heavily regulated.

This seems like good governance that respects peoples' choices while trying to limit harms to me.

It would be cool to see stuff like plain packaging laws like we have in Aus, although iirc only one other country has done that so it's a rare and remarkable success. However aus also has extremely steep sin taxes that poverty trap people (a pack of durries is about 30 usd iirc) and this has created a vibrant black market leading to daylight firebombing of rival gang tobacconists so like it has failed pretty bad otherwise. Also private companies dumped huge amounts of money into promoting vaping leading to a massive increase in nicotine use among the young, seems like a state monopoly would've been better.

Seriously what do you want them to do? Overrule preferences or do the slow thing of changing public opinion respectfully?

Edit: also specifically what measures? A ban on advertising, in schools, in healthcare facilities (difficult! Something like 60% of doctors smoke lol), public transport, offices, and the creation of smoke free public spaces is the same as aus/usa/France/uk etc I think, ban on ads and harm awareness ads seems comparable (they don't label packets with harm warnings like some countries I think, that could be improved), a ban on private companies is further than most countries, they allow them to be sold openly unlike some countries that require them behind the counter, age restrictions are either not a thing or not well enforced which is bad, they've comitted to using price signals which personally I think is dog shit but that's also in line with other countries, they rattified the WHO treaty on tobacco which is again in line with most.

I think all you can concretely point to is that they started late (v. common in the region, different attitudes to tobacco and poorer infrastructure/education/awareness of harms) and that penalties aren't super steep but personally I think fines and harsh punishment to drug addicted people is exceptionally cruel and other means should be looked at.

I'm not sure what the status if subsidy for smoking cessation aids is but it is an active area of research in Chinese medical universities and attracts reasonable amounts of funding.

the articles that video cites, for people like me that would rather a 10 minute read than a 30 minute video essay ↓

https://examination.news/3QHCKdg https://examination.news/4ueS3sm

They were pretty interesting, though it would've been nice if you included them in your first comment.

The least charitable interpretation of the Belt and Road Initiative is that it's an alternative to the IMF

Would you prefer private companies be doing it? The government is trying to reduce smoking and prices are low enough not to trap addicted people in poverty.

It's not like Phillip Morris does better.

Drug production is such an obvious thing that should be nationalised to remove the profit incentive and introduce a degree of accountability and collective control.

i guess anywhere with legal cigarettes have a level of state sponsored cancer, having it as a nationalised industry would probably aid in keeping things somewhat clean.

True socialists smoke a pack of Marxloros, the workers choice of cancer!

At least China has cheaper/free healthcare.

A great follow up!