World No Tobacco Day 2021

Tobacco use is the greatest single source of preventable death and disease worldwide—responsible for 8 million deaths each year.

To mark World No Tobacco Day on May 31, 2021, Vital Strategies and partners launched new campaigns and initiatives to echo the World Health Organization’s commitment to encourage quitting as well as to build support for policies, such as smoke–free environments and tobacco tax increases, and to keep the industry out of tobacco control legislation.

Vital Strategies launched a new platform, The Tobacco Enforcement and Reporting Movement (TERM), a real–time dashboard that regularly monitors and tracks online tobacco marketing in India. TERM’s monthly situation reports will serve as a technical assistance tool for governments and civil society seeking to restrict tobacco marketing. From March 16 to April 15 alone, 890 examples of tobacco marketing were noted. Vital Strategies is pleased to launch TERM in India, with Indonesia and countries in Latin America to follow.

With the rise of internet use during COVID–19, youth are spending more time online, where tobacco marketing is rampant. Vital Strategies conducted a first–of–its–kind study with 2,000+ adolescents in Indonesia aged 13–15 years. The study found that most adolescents regularly see and hear tobacco marketing on Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and TikTok—strengthening the need for tobacco regulations to protect youth.

Read our data brief to learn more insights from this study.

Vital Strategies launched campaigns in eight countries to bolster the World Health Organization’s commitment to encourage quitting by building support for healthy policies, such as smoke-free environments. In India, “When You Quit,” communicates the harms of tobacco use and the importance of cessation. Read the blog.

We’re committed to ensuring everyone, everywhere, is protected by a strong public health system. That includes protection from the harms of tobacco and the tobacco industry.

Read the full statement.

Vital Strategies celebrates the accomplishments of our partners and colleagues including Princess Dina Mired, Vital Strategies’ Special Envoy for Noncommunicable Diseases and Tuba Durgut, Vice President of the Health, Family, Labour and Social Affairs Commission of Turkey’s Grand National Assembly. Read the release.

Vital Strategies works globally and in more than 40 countries to support the adoption of proven policies to reduce tobacco use. Our global team of experts use policy, advocacy and strategic communication to help governments adopt lifesaving, public health “best buys” such as comprehensive smoke–free laws and high tobacco taxes. Our evidence–based media campaigns have been seen by more than 2 billion people around the world. We partner with American Cancer Society to produce The Tobacco Atlas, the most comprehensive report on the evolving global tobacco epidemic, and support production of WHO’s MPOWER reports. Vital Strategies is a main partner in the $1 billion Bloomberg Initiative to Reduce Tobacco Use and a partner in the global tobacco industry watchdog, Stopping Tobacco Organizations and Products (STOP).

For more information on Vital Strategies’ work in tobacco control, please visit: https://www.vitalstrategies.org/programs/tobacco–control

Follow us on Twitter at @VitalStrat, Instagram at @vitalstrategies, Facebook at @vitalstrategies and LinkedIn at Vital Strategies

[Webmaster’s note: I took this from an email I received from Vital Strategies on June 4^th 2021. I was unable to to include any of the pictures. —Nancy Behrendt]