FEB/MAR 2007
Volume 13 - No. 1
SRNT Newsletter
February/March 2007, Volume 13, Number 1
Updates on Plans for the First SRNT Latin
America Meeting and Second Iberoamerican
Meeting on Tobacco Control:
Strengthening the Science for Tobacco Control
in the Age of the FCTC
There are 95 million smokers in Latin America and the Caribbean and approximately 506,000 die every year from smoking related disease. This conference will bring together people with different and complementary expertise to exchange information and motivate even greater efforts in the region to control tobacco. The conference objectives are to:
- encourage involvement in public health science and policy development on tobacco use throughout Latin America, and
- bring together tobacco control scientists and policy advocates to learn from the latest science and from each other
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In 2004, SRNT celebrated its 10th anniversary. During its first decade, SRNT grew from around 100 to over 900 members, sponsored well-attended annual meetings and influential satellite conferences to promote research, and founded a new peer reviewed journal Nicotine and Tobacco Research. Over these ten years, considerable progress has been made in meeting the objective of the society to stimulate new knowledge about nicotine in all its forms. The Society currently has over a thousand members, including many top experts on nicotine and tobacco from over 20 countries around the world.
SRNT's mission is to stimulate the generation of new knowledge concerning nicotine in all its manifestations -- from molecular to societal. The society has three main aims:
- To sponsor scientific meetings and publications fostering the exchange of information on nicotine and tobacco;
- To encourage scientific research on public health efforts for the prevention and treatment of tobacco use;
- To provide a means by which legislative, governmental, regulatory, and other public agencies can obtain expert advice and consultation on nicotine and tobacco.
Although SRNT's growth has been encouraging, SRNT membership is concentrated in North America and Europe, and SRNT would like to make a greater effort to support its aims in other regions of the world. Working together, SRNT and the Inter American Heart Foundation (IAHF) are organizing the first SRNT Latin America conference, and second Iberoamerican conference on Tobacco Control, which will be held in Rio de Janeiro, 5-7 September 2007.
The InterAmerican Heart Foundation (IAHF) is an organization dedicated to promoting health and reducing heart diseases and stroke in Latin America and the Caribbean. Over the past 10 years, IAHF has had tobacco control in the region as a main priority. IAHF has worked with other advocacy organizations towards mobilizing governments and civil society to ratify the FCTC. It has helped organize NGOs in countries that did not have a movement, has initiated a media contest to involve journalists in writing about tobacco control issues, and has organized capacity-building sessions on advocacy in various cities. It also has set up a website on tobacco control in Spanish (http://www.ficnet.org/) and more recently, it has developed an online course on tobacco control, (http://www.cursocontroltabaco.org). At present, IAHF is working with the FCA to monitor progress on the FCTC. In addition to advocacy activities, the IAHF has supported research, smoking cessation programs, and the Pan American Health Organization program Smoke Free Americas to promote smoke-free environments.
This meeting has the support of many professionals throughout Latin America and of key organizations including SRNT Europe and the American Cancer Society (ACS). The conference presidents are Analice Gigliotti, who organizes an annual meeting on tobacco control in Rio, and Beatriz Marcet Champagne, Chief Executive of the Inter American Heart Foundation. The remainder of the Conference Planning Committee is: Martin Raw, Nottingham University, England, chair of the scientific program; Harry Lando, SRNT USA; Jacques le Houezec, SRNT Europe; Sabrina Presman, Brazil; Paula Akil, Brazil; and Catherine Jo, ACS.
The Program Committee includes: Analice Gigliotti, Beatriz Marcet Champagne, Martin Raw, Sabrina Presman, Paula Akil, Harry Lando, Jacques le Houezec, Mira Aghi, Catherine Jo, Eduardo Bianco, Tania Cavalcante, Franklin Rubinstein, Paula Johns, Angelo Campana, Ricardo Meireles, Jacqueline Issa, Carlos Viegas, Guadalupe Ponciano, Natasha Herrera, María Paz Corvalan, Horacio Giraldo, Amanda Sica, Daniel Seijas, Javier Toledo, Raul Sansores, Humberto Martins, and José Ramon Calvo.
About the Authors: Martin Raw, Scientific Program Chair, is an Honorary Senior Lecturer in Public Health Science, University of London, Visiting Professor at the Sao Paulo Medical School, Federal University of Sao Paulo, and manager of SRNT/UICC's www.treatobacco.net . Analice Gigliotti, Conference President, is with the Chemical Dependence Unit, Santa Casa General Hospital, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Prior to her work with the InterAmerican Heart Foundation, Beatriz Champagne, Conference President, taught strategy and public policy at the University of Texas at Dallas, and she served as Director of Planning and Marketing Strategy at the American Heart Association.