First WHO Public Hearing on the Silent Epidemic.

Taking sometimes starkly different stances, representatives of over 160 organizations expressed their views at a public hearing in Geneva on the proposed Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. Representatives from public health agencies, community-based organizations and academic institutions to most major multinational tobacco companies, as well as tobacco farming groups, addressed the two-day forum. Organized by the World Health Organization (WHO) in October, it was the first public hearing since May 1999 when the 191-member World Health Assembly, the governing body of WHO, unanimously backed a resolution calling for work to begin on a new legal instrument that could address the diverse issues involved in tobacco consumption, which the agency has reported as killing 4 million people each year.

While those concerned with public health urged rapid and decisive action to address the impact of tobacco use on the current and future health of populations, especially in developing countries, most tobacco companies concentrated on what they believed to be the boundaries of "reasonable" and "appropriate" actions. Some even continue to deny that passive smoking constitutes a threat to health. The positions of WHO and most Member States are that there are four ways to reduce the harm of tobacco to health: preventing youth and non-smokers from smoking; encouraging and supporting smokers to quit; stopping non-smokers from being exposed to tobacco smoke; and reducing the levels of harmful constituents in tobacco products.