Month: March 2023

We had a dream….

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WHO loves harm reduction – but not for smokers

We had a dream… We had a dream about a comprehensive publication that would highlight best examples of risk reduction policies and approaches in non-communicable diseases (NCDs) and how they could influence tobacco control.

In this dream about NCD  best-buys was this recently published WHO report on sodium, which does not call for a ban on salt, even though excessive salt intake causes raised blood pressure and increases risk of cardiovascular disease and is associated with 1.89 million deaths each year. This publication provides policymakers with science-based alternative actions that avoid a prohibitionist approach.

There was another new WHO report in our dream. This one is about road safety. Around 1.3 million people die and millions more are injured or disabled because of road traffic accidents every year. Instead of banning cars, motorcycles, buses, and other vehicles, WHO with partners is calling to adopt policies aiming at increasing use of seatbelts and child restraints. WHO is calling for harm reduction, in other words. In the publication they reminded us of other measures aimed at reducing risks,  such as the introduction of speed limits, the creation of safer infrastructure, the enforcement of limits on blood alcohol concentration while driving, and improvements in vehicle safety.

Then our imagination, boosted by R.E.M., moved to publications that would encourage people to drop the most toxic risk factors and replace them with better alternatives. And then this WHO report on the replacement of trans-fatty acids with healthier oils and fats appeared. This provides guidance on finding the best replacement oils for industrially produced Trans Fatty Acids, and on designing and implementing strategies to promote the use of alternatives.

And then we were rudely awakened by a Twitter notification from the FCTC account inviting us to a launch of their new publication. And the spell was broken. Because we already know that we cannot expect a similar harm reduction approach when it comes to tobacco. Yet again, we will hear whining that there are no safer alternatives to smoking, and that tobacco and nicotine products should be banned. Just not the cigarettes.

Why can’t WHO just look at their own examples, as in our dream, and see that their stubborn stance on tobacco just doesn’t make sense?

In the words of Martin Luther King “we must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope”.

Where are the FCTC Bureau meeting minutes?

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It seems that the long march towards a triumphant COP10 later this year must surely have encountered a hitch. The second meeting of the FCTC Bureau took place at the end of November 2022, but here we are at the start of March and the minutes of their last meeting have still not been published. Has their typewriter broken?

The role of the Bureau is to make proposals which are then circulated to regional coordinators. Considering the next Bureau meeting is scheduled for 27-28 March, it does not leave much time to enable the regions to digest what has gone before.

Items at the November meeting would have likely included discussions about the provisional COP10 agenda, requests from parties for elements to be included and maybe details for delegates of the hosting arrangements in Panama. Quite important information.

It is difficult to believe that the regions will not be eager to learn about these matters, so the delay is inconvenient, to say the least.

Or is it that the Bureau is communicating with regions behind the scenes and are reluctant to publish their minutes for the public to see just yet?

We look forward to the typewriter engineers being available to fix this problem soon, and look forward to the belated publication of the Bureau minutes so that the famous WHO FCTC reputation for openness and transparency is protected.