Brazzaville, 21 March 2007 -- Thirty WHO Member States from the African Region which have ratified the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) are meeting in Brazzaville, Congo, to prepare for the implementation of the treaty – the first negotiated under the auspices of WHO.

“This workshop provides you with an opportunity to share information on specific issues related to the FCTC such as legislation, and financial measures, crop diversification, and monitoring and evaluation”; WHO Regional Director for Africa, Dr Luis Sambo, said in a message to participants in the workshop which opened in the Congolese capital on Tuesday.

He challenged them to come up with “concrete suggestions that can be implemented on how to deal with these complex issues in the African context”.

Dr Sambo exhorted the remaining 10 countries in the African Region which have signed the FCTC but have not yet ratified it to do so. He also urged the six countries in the region which have not yet signed the convention to accede to it.

Dr Sambo’s message was delivered by the Director of the Division of Prevention and Control of Noncommunicable Diseases at the WHO Regional Office for Africa, Dr Rufaro Chatora.

Use of tobacco -- by an estimated 1.1 billion individuals worldwide in the 1990s -- is the largest cause of preventable death in industrialized countries. In 2002 alone, tobacco use caused 4.9 million deaths worldwide, Dr Sambo said, warning that the epidemic of tobacco addiction, disease and death was rapidly shifting to developing and transitional market countries.

The majority of smokers today are in the developing world.

WHO estimates that if the epidemic goes unchecked it will be the leading cause of premature death worldwide within the next two on three decades.

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