Eff ective tobacco control is key to rapid progress in reduction of non-communicable diseases

Stanton Glantz, Mariaelena Gonzalez
Non-communicable diseases (NCDs)—including cardiovascular diseases, chronic respiratory diseases, cancer, and diabetes—account for about 60% of global deaths, mostly in countries of low or middle income. Tobacco use accounts for a sixth of these deaths.1 As a response, a high-level meeting (including 34 heads of state) held in September, 2011, at the UN adopted the Political Declaration of the High-Level Meeting of the General Assembly on the Prevention and Control of Noncommunicable Diseases.2

The declaration acknowledged the global eff ect of NCDs, particularly those that are most prominent: cardiovascular diseases, cancers, chronic respiratory diseases, and diabetes.

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