Nearly half a billion people in China never brush their teeth.

It is estimated that less than half of the rural population and only TEN PERCENT of Chinese city dwellers have proper dental hygiene! It’s so bad that many people resort to using twigs or green tea to clean their teeth, either out of tradition or out of necessity due to poverty. Even former chairman Mao Zedong is said to have had teeth that were stained green!

Now the Chinese national committee for oral health has been encouraging people to brush and go to the dentist. Currently, for every 60,000 people in China, there is only one dentist.

The whole story from CNN.