A webinar on 20 November kicked off the recently launched Community of Practice on NCDs & Commercial Determinants of Health, hosted by the WHO Global Coordinating Mechanism and the Global Health Centre at Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies.

Titled Commercial Actors = Health Actors?, the event focused on corporate influence on consumption worldwide and health policy makers’ attempts to regulate private-sector activities.

The webinar featured the following speakers and topics:

• Jeff Collin, Professor of Global Health Policy at the University of Edinburgh — Corporate strategies and NCDs – do we know enough already?
• Charlotte Ersbøll, Senior Advisor to UN Global Compact — Competitiveness and health – where do we see pro-health innovations in firms that can scale?
• Dr. Tim Lobstein, Director of Policy, World Obesity Foundation — Lifestyle vs. determinants – where does our ability to make healthy consumption choices end?
• Robert Marten, Researcher at the London School of Tropical Medicine — Partnerships for fighting NCDs – is it impossible?

WHO/GCMS Knowledge Action Portal (KAP)

Organized as a virtual discussion group under the roof of the WHO/GCMS Knowledge Action Portal (KAP), the CoP/CDoH serves as a platform to pool and discuss insights from researchers, policy makers, civil society, and companies.

The CoP will run for 12 months covering thematic areas such as policy and commercial innovation for CDoH, global supply chains, global financial flows, global marketing, and policy influence or corporations.

Its steering group members are: Charles-Etienne De Cidrac, Jeff Collin, Alessandro Demaio, Peng Gong, Tilakavati Karupaiah, Ilona Kickbusch, Marion Nestle, Nina Renshaw, Rob Moodie, Jeff Sachs, Jonathan Tench, Alejandro Calvillo Unna, Suneel Vatsyayan.