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Since the surgeon general's report laid bare the health hazards from smoking 50 years ago, the proportion of Americans who smoke has fallen dramatically.

About 19 percent of American adults smoke these days, compared with about 42 percent in 1965.

Smoking has become less prevalent in other countries, too, including Canada, Mexico and Iceland.

Overall, the prevalence of smoking has gone down worldwide over the past few decades. For men, smoking dropped 10 percentage points to 31 percent in 2012, from 41 percent in 1980. For women, it has been almost halved, falling from about 11 percent to 6 percent over the same period.

But that's not the case everywhere. So where is smoking still common?

Researchers at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation crunched the data and made them easy to noodle with.

The map above shows hot spots. Greece, Bulgaria and Macedonia look like the burning tip of a cigarette. Russia, France and Austria aren't far behind.

Click here or on the map to find the tobacco visualization tools put together by the institute.

One of the interactive maps lets you look at how prevalence changed from 2011 to 2012. Smoking has gone up recently in Sweden, Belarus and Mexico. It's down in the U.S., Hungary and Argentina.

You can also go beyond prevalence, and see how many cigarettes smokers are lighting up each year. By that measure, Suriname stands out on the high side.

One last thing about prevalence. While the proportion of the world's population that smokes has shrunk, the number of people on the earth continues to rise. So when you do the math, the total number of smokers has increased, despite all the public health efforts against tobacco use.

Bottom line: There were 967 million people who smoked in 2012, compared with 721 million in 1980.

The methods the researchers used to estimate smoking and the results of their analysis were published in JAMA, the American Medical Association's journal.

The year ended on a high note for U.S. employment, with December ticking off 238,000 new private-sector jobs, topping the previous month for the best showing of 2013, according to the latest data from the ADP National Employment Report.

The survey from the payroll processing firm and economists at Moody's Analytics is "encouraging news that hopefully bodes well for 2014," Carlos Rodriguez, president and CEO of ADP says in the report released Wednesday.

Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's says: "The job market ended 2013 on a high note. Job growth meaningfully accelerated and is now over 200,000 per month. Job gains are broad-based across industries, most notably in construction and manufacturing. It appears that businesses are growing more confident and increasing their hiring."

On the non-farm payroll, small businesses added 108,000 jobs, with the gains roughly evenly distributed between the smallest companies with 1-19 employees and those with 20-49 workers. Medium-sized businesses added 59,000 jobs and large ones gained 71,000. Companies employee 500-999 employees actually shed 3,000 jobs, but the very largest (1,000+ employees) made up the difference.

Professional/business services led the sector gains, adding 53,000 positions, followed by construction, which was hardest-hit during the recession — it added 48,000.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics is set to release the latest employment figures on Friday. Last month, employers added 203,000 jobs and in a separate BLS survey, the unemployment rate dropped to 7 percent, its lowest mark in five years.

Meanwhile, a three-month extension of federal unemployment insurance passed a key procedural hurdle in the Senate on Tuesday, garnering the necessary 60 votes to move forward for further consideration. If the measure makes it through both chambers, it would retart checks to some 1.3 million of the long-term unemployed.

There's good news from Antarctica, where two ships that had been stuck in ice — one of them for about two weeks — have managed to get to open waters.

That's allowed the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Polar Star, which is capable of breaking through heavy polar ice and had been headed to the scene to offer assistance, to return to its original mission — clearing a channel to Antarctica's McMurdo Station research base and bringing supplies to that facility.

The Coast Guard says the Polar Star "was released by the Australian Maritime Safety Authority from search and rescue duties [on Tuesday], following confirmation [that] the Russian-Flagged Akademik Shokalskiy and Chinese-Flagged Xue Long are free from the Antarctic ice due to a favorable change in wind conditions."

As we've been reporting, the MV Akademik Shokalskiy got stuck on Christmas Eve when rough weather caused a shift in the ice. Aboard the ship: 52 scientists and paying passengers, mostly from Australia, who were on an expedition to retrace the steps of retrace the steps of Australian explorer Douglas Mawson. He led the Australasian Antarctic Expedition of 1911-14.

Two icebreakers, the Xue Long and the Australian-flagged Aurora Australis, tried and failed to reach the Akademik Shokalskiy. A helicopter from the Xue Long was, however, able to ferry the 52 passengers to the Aurora Australis on Jan. 2. The Russian ship's crew stayed behind. So did the Chinese vessel after it, too, got trapped in the ice.

It was hoped that the weather would change and allow both the Akademic Shokalskiy and the Xue Long to break free on their own. But just in case, the Polar Star was sent Sunday from Sydney to see if it could assist.

Then the hoped-for change in conditions happened.

Meanwhile, the Aurora Australis and its passengers have reached the Case base on the coast of East Antarctica, according to the BBC.

The Guardian, which has two correspondents traveling with the expedition, says the Aurora Australis is scheduled to be at the base for five days, "with the crew working in shifts 24 hours a day to transfer 420,000 litres of fuel (known as 'special Antarctic blend'), unload 140 tonnes of cargo and pick up 210 tonnes onto the ship. ... While the crew resupplies the base, a few of the scientists on board the Aurora will carry out short-term projects ashore while the ship is moored in the bay."

Should they or shouldn't they? That's the question Brazilians are asking themselves after Edward Snowden's "open letter" lauding Brazil's role in protecting privacy rights, alluding to his hand in uncovering spying on their president — and seeking political asylum.

"Today, if you carry a cell phone in Sao [Paulo], the NSA can and does keep track of your location," wrote Snowden, 30, who is living in temporary asylum in Russia. "They do this 5 billion times a day to people around the world."

Last month, a group of Brazilian senators came out in support of the former NSA contractor. And even Luis Roberto Barroso – a judge on Brazil's highest court — spoke in his defense.

"He gave an unequivocal service to governments around the world and U.S. citizens," writes Hlio Schwartsman in Folha de Sao Paulo. "... I am of the opinion that, if he asks, asylum should be granted."

But not all columnists agree. Reinaldo Azevedo wrote in the right wing Veja magazine's blog: "Snowden is a traitor to his own country. ... What does Brazil gain by giving him shelter?"

"It is very unlikely asylum will be given," says Pedro Arruda, a political analyst at Sao Paulo's Catholic University. "President Dilma Rousseff has already expressed herself. Or rather, her silence has given her opinion."

Brazil's government has indeed been circumspect. It says that Snowden has not formally asked for asylum, so it hasn't considered the matter — hardly rolling out the welcome mat.

Paulo Sotero, director of the Brazil Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center, says Rousseff already showed her displeasure by postponing a state visit to the U.S. Rousseff also is pushing United Nations action on global Internet privacy issues.

Several months ago, Rio de Janeiro-based journalist Glenn Greenwald reported in the Brazilian press that the NSA was spying on Rousseff's personal emails and on the state oil company Petrobras. The allegations were based on documents Greenwald got from Snowden.

Rousseff "obviously was very upset about the revelations, but values Brazil-U.S. relations and knows how important it is to cultivate that relationship," Sotero says. "Especially in that moment that Brazil is starting to face some tough economic [issues] and needs to integrate its economy with advanced countries, especially the United States."

Julia Sweig, director of Latin America studies for the Council on Foreign Relations, says while Snowden is a popular figure in Brazil, his fate is not at the top of the agenda.

"I don't think the Brazilian public is, by and large, looking to pick a big public fight with the United States," she says, adding that asylum for Snowden would be a "bridge too far" for Brazil.