Tobacco use is a major preventable cause of premature death and disease worldwide. Approximately 5.4 million people die each year due to tobacco-related illnesses – a figure expected to increase to more than 8 million a year by 2030. 1 The vast majority of these deaths are projected to occur in the developing world.
The Bloomberg Initiative to Reduce Tobacco Use targets 15 high-burden, low- and middle-income countries that, together, account for approximately two-thirds of the world’s smokers. As a partner in the Bloomberg Initiative, the CDC Foundation helps CDC work with the World Health Organization (WHO) and other partners internationally to implement the Global Adult Tobacco Survey (GATS), which helps countries monitor adult tobacco use, exposure to second-hand smoke, quit attempts and the effectiveness of tobacco control measures among adults. Data for the survey are collected through face-to-face interviews using electronic data collection.
GATS is made possible by a grant to the CDC Foundation from Bloomberg Philanthropies. An additional grant to the CDC Foundation from The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is supporting GATS implementation in China and WHO's Africa region.
“The CDC Foundation is one of the important partners in this initiative,” says Dr. Samira Asma, chief of CDC’s Global Tobacco Control Branch in the Office on Smoking and Health. “CDC develops the strategy, and the CDC Foundation helps us achieve it.”
In addition to funding, the CDC Foundation provides logistical and administrative support – arranging travel for experts involved in the initiative, managing the procurement of handheld devices and software used for data collection, and working with CDC and WHO to review and evaluate proposals submitted by participating countries.
To date GATS has been successfully implemented in 14 countries. Despite the fact that countries like Brazil, China and India are among the world’s top tobacco producers, Asma says that leaders in these countries support the work because they recognize that tobacco-related health care costs not only counterbalance but also exceed any profits from tobacco sales.
Asma believes that impetus is building for a global movement to reduce, and maybe one day eliminate, the impact of tobacco use on public health. “I think there is a movement, there is a momentum,” she says. “People want to breathe clean air.”
1 WHO Report on the Tobacco Epidemic, 2008: The MPOWER Package. Geneva, World Health Organization, 2008.
