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YEŞiLAY
TheTurkishGreenCrescentSocietyconvened theOICmember countries in Istanbul todiscuss
Turkey's successful struggleagainst tobacco inaworkshoporganized incooperationwith the
MinistryofHealthand theSESRIC.
TOBACCO CONTROL POLICIES FOR
ISLAMIC COUNTRIES
T
he Turkish Green Crescent Society shared its successful an-
ti-tobacco practices with other countries at the Workshop
on TobaccoControl Policies of Organization of Islamic Coope-
ration (OIC) Countries, held in Istanbul on December 14-16.
The Workshop on Tobacco Control Policies of Organization of Isla-
mic Cooperation (OIC) Countries, organized by the Turkish Green
Crescent Society in cooperation with the Ministry of Health and
theStatistical Economic andSocial Research and TrainingCentre for
Islamic Countries (SESRIC) was kicked off at Sepetçiler Pavilion on
December 14.
In his opening remarks, Vice President of the Turkish Green Crescent
Society Assistant Professor Akif Seylan indicated that the Turkish
Green Crescent Society has 108 branches in Turkey and affiliations in
34 countries and sees it a major responsibility to convey its knowle-
dge, experience and best practices in combating addictions to sister
countries. Noting that they aimto start amajor cooperation and soli-
darity campaign in the fight against tobacco addiction among Islamic
countries byworking closelywith theOIC and theMinistry of Health,
Seylan draw attention to the fact that tobacco addiction is a global
public health problem that causes 6million deaths globally each year
and these facts about tobacco have caused the international com-
munity includingtheWorldHealthOrganization (WHO) totakeaction.
"Tobaccoconsumption rates inTurkeyaredeclining"
Seylan called attention to the results of the Global Youth Tobacco
Survey (GYTS).
"Thesurveyshowsthattheprevalenceoftobaccouseamongyoung
people is higher than 20 percent in half of theOIC countries. Despite
the fact that the consumption rates have declined by 10percent due
to the tobacco control measures implemented in developed count-
ries during the last 30 years, the decline in Islamic countries is only
3 percent. This underscores the need for tobacco control policy and
regulations in themember countries. In particular, an overwhelming
majority of Muslims continue to consume tobacco despite the fact
that Islam attaches great importance to health of individuals. The
Qur'an cautions Muslims saying that they are responsible for what
they do on their own. We are proud to implement successful practi-
ces in Turkey. Both the public authorities and nongovernmental or-
ganizations (NGOs) have attached great importance to this matter
and worked toward a tobacco-free Turkey, and this has made Tur-
key a leading country in the world. This success is confirmed by the
surveys as well. According to the surveys held between 2008 and
2012 in countrywhere tobacco consumption is historically high, the
tobacco consumption prevalence has declined from 31.2 percent to
27.1 percent," he said.
Ministry of Finance and Ministry of Health experts from Afghanis-
tan, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Ivory Coast, Djibouti, Gambia, Guyana,
Iraq, Jordan, Pakistan, Senegal, Sudan, Tajikistan, Togo, Tunisia, BAE,
Uganda andYemenattended the three-dayworkshop.TheMinistry
of Health, the Ministry of Finance, the Tobacco and Alcohol Market
Regulatory Authority and the Turkish Statistical Institute from
Turkey also shared their experiences regarding the tobacco cont-
rol policies. During the workshop, the experts made presentations
concerning theWorldHealthOrganization's FrameworkConvention
on Tobacco Control and MPOWER measures, tobacco consumption
in the OIC countries, the "Green Detector" mobile application, to-
bacco control policies in Turkey, tobacco advertising, sales, taxation,
packaging, and the "Water Pipe Facts" campaign.The guest partici-
pants provided information on the progress their respective count-
ries havemade in tobacco control policies and the survey results.
GREEN CRESCENT-2016