---
title: "Tobacco Control & NCD Prevention"
date: 2020-04-01T22:28:00-04:00
author: Mike Mella
canonical_url: "https://healthbridge.ca/tobacco-control-ncd-prevention"
section: Main Menu Pages
---
[ ![Sian FitzGerald](https://healthbridge.ca/dist/images/Staff/_150x150_crop_center-center_90_none/4764/Sian_2015_SM.webp) ](https://healthbridge.ca/staff/sian-fitzgerald)

 [Sian FitzGerald](https://healthbridge.ca/staff/sian-fitzgerald) is the contact for our Tobacco Control & NCD Prevention program.

  ![](/dist/images/bridge-bg.svg) 

Tobacco use is one of the single most preventable causes of death in the world. Given that people living with low-incomes are more likely to use tobacco, and can afford it the least, tobacco use can also greatly worsen poverty. Tobacco cultivation and use also harm the environment and contribute to climate change.

Tobacco use is the one risk factor common to four major non-communicable diseases ([NCDs](http://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/noncommunicable-diseases)): cancers, cardiovascular and lung disease, and diabetes. The other major risk factors for these devastating diseases are: physical inactivity, unhealthy diet and misuse of alcohol.

NCDs are far from ‘diseases of the rich’: in many the Global South, the risk of dying from any of the major NCDs between the ages of 30 and 70 is double or even triple that in a typical rich country.

Fortunately, international research and experience has shown the most effective way to curb tobacco use: implementing the measures in the [WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC)](http://www.who.int/fctc/about/en/). Its measures include raising taxes, implementing and enforcing 100% indoor smoke-free spaces, health warnings related to tobacco use, bans on tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship, and helping smokers to quit. Full implementation of the FCTC will result in healthier populations and environments, and will help to eliminate poverty.

Our strategy is to support and promote policy-based solutions for reducing all NCD risk factors. We support long-term programs to build networks, conduct research, produce evidence, and advocate for change. Activities include research and education on the ways that tobacco and NCDs can worsen poverty and the impact of implementation of best practices on health and the economy; supporting partners and communities to implement best practice interventions; monitoring and exposing tobacco and alcohol industry interference tactics, and producing materials on tobacco control and NCD prevention, including transferring lessons learned from tobacco control to NCD prevention.

 

 

#### Learn

### What We Do

 

Our early work on tobacco and poverty, and ensuring that tobacco control is recognized as a development issue, has expanded to include NCD prevention. There is growing global recognition of the importance of including tobacco control and NCD prevention in national and international development plans.

Our work promotes policy-based NCD prevention and highlights the importance of learning from the many years of successful tobacco control to inform NCD prevention. We also ensure that tobacco control remains central to NCD prevention, while contributing to the evidence base on the link between NCD prevention and development issues.