Brazil Forum Focuses on NCDs Burden

Public health experts from around the world met in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in November 2003 to discuss ways of slowing the growth of the global burden of noncommunicable diseases (NCDs), which increasingly are affecting developing as well as developed countries.

Participants presented data showing that diseases such as hypertension, cancer and heart disease account for 60 percent of deaths worldwide and three-quarters of deaths in the Americas region. Most of the risk factors for these illnesses are related to lifestyle, and research shows that the most efficient and cost-effective way of fighting them is through preventive health policies and services.

Most NCD risk factors are lifestyle-related. ©PhotoDisc, Inc.

Among presenters at the conference, held Nov. 9–12, was Pekka Puska, director of NCD prevention at the World Health Organization (WHO). He noted that seven of the top 10 global risk factors for NCDs are related to diet, physical activity and tobacco use. He urged NCD experts to concentrate their work in these areas.

"This has to be the priority," Puska told participants. "We have to reduce our goals if we want our actions to be more effective." He also deplored the gap between the burden of disease caused by NCDs and the resources dedicated to fighting them.

Among other participants were representatives of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) and WHO's five other regions, along with members of nongovernmental organizations and country health authorities.

Sylvia Robles, chief of PAHO’s Noncommunicable Diseases Unit, presented an update on PAHO's CARMEN network, which links people working to reduce risk factors of NCDs in the Americas. CARMEN (Initiative for Integrated Noncommunicable Disease Prevention) supports the development and evaluation of policies, social mobilization and community-based interventions, epidemiological surveillance of NCD risk conditions, and preventive health services.

During the Brazil meeting, CARMEN members announced that the network would develop a new "CARMEN School," offering a first course on "evidence-based public health." The course, offered in March in Santiago, Chile, will be sponsored by PAHO, the Catholic University of Chile, St. Louis University in Missouri, USA, and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), with the participation of several public health schools in the region.

In addition, PAHO launched the new Virtual Health Library for NCDs, which will serve as a tool for networks such as CARMEN to share information and ideas and to develop communities of practice.

Another key development at the forum was the launching of the Global Fruit and Vegetable Program, a strategy developed by WHO and the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) to increase consumption of fruits and vegetables throughout the world. The program calls attention to the fact that low intake of fruits and vegetables causes an estimated 2.7 million deaths each year, according to the World Health Report 2002. This makes it one of the top 10 risk factors for global mortality as well as one of the leading causes of NCDs.