In honor of World No Tobacco Day, the Supreme Council of Health (SCH) is raising awareness about the dangers of smoking with displays at several shopping malls. Carrefour and other supermarkets appear to be doing their parts by not selling tobacco today.

One out of three people living in Qatar is now addicted to smoking, up from 20 percent in 2006, according to the Qatar Statistics Authority. A third of male addicts and 12 percent of female addicts smoke more than 20 cigarettes a day.

Exposure to second-hand smoke is also a growing problem here, states a new study from Weill Cornell Medical College in Qatar. It found that 80 percent of pregnant Qatari women are exposed to passive smoke.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), tobacco causes more deaths than HIV, illegal drug use, alcohol use, traffic accidents, suicides and murders combined, killing some six million people a year across the world.

Thoughts?

Credit: Photo of Carrefour by Qaisar on Twitter; all other photos by Penny Yi Wang