About Conference

Health of its people is central to the developments in any country. There havebeen organised efforts at National and International to ensure health for all theCitizens of the world through socioeconomic development. A number ofinitiatives have been taken from time to time to deal with control andelimination of various communicable diseases. Over a period of time, there hasbeen good progress in treatment of ever increasing Non-Communicable Diseases as well. However, the World today is facing a number of diseasesrelated to various addiction and Mental Health. One of the important issueswhich have been given lot of importance by most of countries in developed aswell as developing countries is actions required against tobacco consumptions.

In India tobacco use is responsible for 13 lacs ‘death out of which are 3,60,000are due to smokeless tobacco use. Tobacco use has a profound and far-reaching impact on India, both on a personal and societal level. On a personallevel, tobacco consumption is a major cause of preventable diseases such asrespiratory illness, cancer and heart disease. More than a million deaths areoccurring because of the non-smokers being exposed to second hand smoke.Thus, we observed that human suffering and loss of life due to tobaccoconsumption, Besides this cost of treating tobacco-related illnesses also placea huge burden on the healthcare system and economy, as well as divertresources away from more productive agricultural activities. On a broaderlevel, the widespread cultivation of tobacco has a damaging effect on theenvironment and depletes valuable resources that could be used for moreproductive agricultural activities.

We conclude that, tobacco consumption and its impact of tobacco in terms ofhealth, alternative use of agricultural land and overall wellbeing of thepopulation is serious issue. This calls for reducing tobacco consumption andpromoting a tobacco-free lifestyle. Government of India has been makingefforts for control through legislative measures as well as dedicated NationalProgram. The need of the hour is to involve all stakeholders in overcoming thechallenges posed by this menace.

The proposed conference on “Towards tobacco-free India – An Audacious RaceAgainst Time” is being organised by International Institute of HealthManagement Delhi to provide a common platform for different stakeholders todiscuss the actions required and way forward for tobacco free India.