In the late 1990s, South Africa banned all tobacco advertising. No more did cigarettes appear on billboards or in newspapers and magazines they werent allowed airtime on radio or TV, and tobacco sponsorships were taboo.
It helped to cut smoking from 32 to 24 by 2003 , a decade after the country first introduced tobacco control laws.
But 20 years later, South Africa isnt the public health darling it once was, and the proportion of adults smoking has stagnated at around 20 in stark contrast to the big wins from before.