Microsoft founder Bill Gates has joined an anti- smoking campaign in China, home to the world's
largest number of smokers, featuring in a music
video as part of a social media drive against passive
smoking. Gates plays a cameo role in the Chinese anti-
smoking music video, which is part of a social media campaign launched by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation of which he is co-chairman. China has more than 300 million smokers and
another 740 million people are exposed to second-
hand smoke each year, according to the National
Health and Family Planning Commission. Feng Zhe, a gold medalist on the parallel bars in the
2012 Olympic Games, released his song 'Say No to
Forced Smoking', state-run China Daily reported. Gates appears in the video wearing a T-shirt
bearing the words of the song title. Gates' campaign received more than 40 million hits
on microblog and tens of thousands of people
voiced their support for the initiative in its first two
weeks, Yang-Jianyue, deputy director of the Gates
Foundation in China, said. The song is the latest initiative in a social media
campaign that began in October. The foundation has joined with social media and
philanthropic partners in calling on netizens to
submit witty sayings against second-hand smoke. "That's why tobacco control needs social media
where you can have other people talking for you
and becoming part of the solution," Angela Pratt of
the WHO Tobacco Free Initiative in China said. "Smoking is not cool, while smoking control can be
cool and dynamic," Pratt said. The UN health body in China will broadcast anti-
smoking videos submitted by contestants from
both China and the United States through online
outlets including its own Sina Weibo account next
week, she said. Last year, President Xi Jinping met with Gates at the
annual Boao Forum for Asia in Hainan province. Xi said China would deepen its cooperation with the
foundation, especially in HIV/AIDS prevention and
control, smoking control and tuberculosis
intervention.

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