World No Tobacco Day 2019: Focus on ‘Tobacco and Lung Health’

This year, the focus of ‘World No Tobacco Day’ is on ‘tobacco and lung health’, as outlined by the WHO.

World No Tobacco day is celebrated annually across the globe to spread awareness about the harmful effects of tobacco use and to discourage tobacco consumption in all forms.

This year, the focus is on ‘tobacco and lung health’. The World Health Organisation (WHO) hopes to raise awareness on two levels through this campaign:

• the negative impact that tobacco has on people’s lung health, from cancer to chronic respiratory disease,
• the fundamental role lungs play for the health and well-being of all people.

“The campaign also serves as a call to action, advocating for effective policies to reduce tobacco consumption and engaging stakeholders across multiple sectors in the fight for tobacco control.”

The focus will be on the multiple ways in which tobacco harms people’s health by causing lung cancer, chronic respiratory diseases, tuberculosis, and indirectly through air pollution, among many more health problems.

The World No Tobacco Day 2019 campaign will raise awareness on the:

• risks posed by tobacco smoking and second-hand smoke exposure;
• awareness on the particular dangers of tobacco smoking to lung health;
• magnitude of death and illness globally from lung diseases caused by tobacco, including chronic respiratory diseases and lung cancer;
• emerging evidence on the link between tobacco smoking and tuberculosis deaths;
• implications of second-hand exposure for lung health of people across age groups;
• importance of lung health to achieving overall health and well-being;
• feasible actions and measures that key audiences, including the public and governments, can take to reduce the risks to lung health posed by tobacco.