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• The World's Heaviest-Smoking Countries  

Thanks to celebrity activism and widespread media attention, HIV, malaria and starvation are well-known diseases of the third world. But there's another resource-draining plague afflicting these countries, one hiding in plain sight: smoking.

While the smoking population is half what it was a generation ago in the U.S. and other industrialized nations, with only one in five using tobacco, it's different in Africa and East Asia, where time stands still when it comes to cigarettes. Smoking rates of 40% or more of the population are common in these regions, making for an extra-tough health hazard when medical services are as limited as filterless, hand rolled smokes are plentiful.

We assembled a list of the countries where the highest percentage of citizens smoke according to the most recent public health data available and ranked them based on that figure. But we also took it further, estimating the potential drain on each nation's potential income opportunity due to smoking deaths as compared to the nation's gross domestic product.

In Pictures: The World's Heaviest-Smoking Countries . . .

In Namibia, where half of the country's two million citizens smoke, the average income is about $3,230 a year, according to the World Bank. How much does the habit drain that? About $448.61 per year in lost income. Multiplied by just over 1 million smokers, it adds up to $461 million in income losses nationwide, or 6.9% of the country's $6.6 million total.

The average lifespan in Namibia is 47

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