NCD Alliance

From the FCA website:

The UN Development Programme (UNDP) is poised to support a strengthened inter-agency approach to implementation of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), says Doug Webb of the UNDP’s Bureau for Development Policy.

Advances in HIV care and treatment that keep people alive while controlling, although not curing, their conditions have led to growing numbers of people surviving with chronic illnesses including HIV infection.

BBC News

A lack of exercise is now causing as many deaths as smoking across the world, a study suggests.

The report, published in the Lancet to coincide with the build-up to the Olympics, estimates that about a third of adults are not doing enough physical activity, causing 5.3m deaths a year.

That equates to about one in 10 deaths from diseases such as heart disease, diabetes and breast and colon cancer.

Researchers said the problem was now so bad it should be treated as a pandemic.

New York- In a demonstration of commitment to addressing non-communicable diseases (NCDs) at the highest political level, UNICEF and the Pan-American Health Organization (PAHO), with NCD Child, held a Ministerial Roundtable on the occasion of this year’s Economic and Social Council Annual Ministerial Review. The breakfast, ‘Working Well!

The UN System Task Team on the Post-2015 Development Agenda released their report to the Secretary General yesterday, outlining the priority areas for the Post-2015 Development Agenda. Citing the need for a "new, more holistic" approach to development, the full report incorporates strong language on non-communicable diseases (NCDs) and the ways the post-2015 could address them.

The PLoS Medicine series on Big Food aims to examine and stimulate debate about the activities and influence of the food industry in global health. We define “Big Food” as the multinational food and beverage industry with huge and concentrated market power. The series adopts a multi-disciplinary approach and includes critical perspectives from around the world. It represents one of first times such issues have been examined in the general medical literature.

The Conversation

Ruth Colagiuri

Rio provided the ideal backdrop for the Rio+20 “earth summit” – with the jungle at its backdoor, nestled among magnificent jagged mountaintops, bordered by kilometres of white sandy Atlantic beaches, and the ever-present favelas, where the very poor live, reminding all of the need to progress the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

Diabetes and climate change are two urgent challenges in the 21st century. The International Diabetes Federation (IDF) has produced a policy report that establishes both the interconnections between these global risks and the opportunity to combat them together. Launched for the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20), the Diabetes and Climate Change Report puts diabetes, NCDs, and health at the center of sustainable development.

The Guardian

The global sustainable development summit that begins next week in Rio is "too important to fail", the UN secretary general, Ban ki-Moon has said.

In a desperate last-minute plea to world leaders before the meeting, Ban said the international community was in danger of squandering a once-in-a-generation opportunity to use the Rio+20 meeting to map out a new course for economic and social development.

The Guardian

Jacques Peretti

Up a rickety staircase at the Newarke Houses Museum in Leicester, England hangs a portrait of Britain's first obese man, painted in 1806. Daniel Lambert weighed 53st (335kg) and was considered a medical oddity. Too heavy to work, Lambert came up with an ingenious idea: he would charge people a shilling to see him. Lambert made a fortune, and his portrait shows him at the end of his life: affluent and respected – a celebrated son of Leicester.