On 12 and 13 December, ENSP members, partners, and friends have gathered in person and online for another annual European Conference on Tobacco Control, held in Paris, France. During two full days, members discussed the future strategy of the organisation, as well as took part in multiple sessions where high-level speakers and experts presented the results of their projects and activities, with the ultimate goal to advance tobacco control research and find new solutions for a tobacco-free world.  For this hybrid onsite/online edition a great number of speakers, delegates, and volunteers contributed to the success of the event. The sessions covered topics such as tobacco industry interference, the EU SUP Directive, taxation, tobacco and alcohol, novel products, and journalistic investigations on the tobacco industry tactics.

The 6th Conference was opened by the ENSP President, Dr. Francisco Rodriguez Lozano, along with the Head of Secretariat of the WHO FCTC, Dr Adriana Blanco Marquizo, who congratulated ENSP and its members for their accomplishment and thanked everyone for the involvement in the promotion of the Convention and the Protocol in Europe, as well as for the knowledge and experience shared with the global network. During the event, ENSP Secretary General, Cornel Radu-Loghin, presented ENSP awards to OCCRP journalists Alessia Cerantola and Andrei Ciurcanu for their tremendous work on exposing big tobacco strategies, as well as a special award remembering the Network’s member and friend Konstantin Krasovsky, to serve as recognition of his efforts to strengthen tobacco control community and improve public health in Ukraine and beyond.

A special session dedicated to ENSP Youth Group was also organised during the event, with the aim of combining advocacy and scientific approach to changing youth’s attitudes to tobacco and smoking behaviour of young people in Europe. Experts from the tobacco control community shared their experience on shaping smoke-free initiatives and further one of the top researchers on the topic, Dr Constantine Vardavas, held a special training targeting early-stage researchers on how to write a research paper.

Head of Secretariat of the WHO FCTC, Dr Adriana Blanco Marquizo, during the welcoming speech for the opening of the ENSP-ECTC in Paris.

“ENSP was granted observer status to the Conference of the Partis of the Convention (…) and it has been playing an active role in promoting the implementation of the Convention for more than a decade.”