Dr Rüdiger Krech, Director, Health Promotion, WHO
| Dr Rüdiger Krech is the Director of the Department of Health Promotion at the World Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva since September 2019. He heads WHO's work on risk factors such as tobacco consumption and harmful use of alcohol; he is responsible for work on health-promoting settings and programmes for more physical activity. In addition to the normative work, his team supports member states in public health legislation and ways to impose additional taxes on unhealthy products. Prior to this, Dr Krech was the Director of Universal Health Coverage and played a key role in placing this issue on the global health agenda. From 2009-2014, Dr Krech was the Director of Social Determinants of Health and Equity, and was responsible, among other things, for organizing the World Conference on this topic. Prior to joining WHO, Dr Krech worked at the German Agency for International Cooperation (GiZ), where he developed and implemented the Social Protection agenda for Germany's development cooperation, and at the WHO Regional Office for Europe in Copenhagen, where he was Head of Unit for Healthy Ageing. Dr Krech studied educational science and human medicine and was one of the first public health (MPH) graduates of a German university in 1991. He was awarded a doctorate in public health (DrPH) at the University of Bielefeld. Dr Krech is married and has three adult daughters.
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Dr Maria Neira, Director, Environmental and Public Health, WHO
| Dr Maria P. Neira was appointed Director, Environmental and Public Health, World Health Organization, Geneva, Switzerland in September 2005. Prior to that, she was Vice-Minister of Health and President of the Spanish Food Safety Agency. She had previously held several senior positions in WHO. Dr Neira began her career as a medical coordinator working with refugees in the Salvador and Honduras for Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders). Dr Neira is a Spanish national, and a medical doctor by training. She specialized in Endocrinology and Metabolic Diseases; and Public Health. Dr Neira has been awarded the Médaille de l'Ordre national du Mérite by the Government of France and is a member of the Academy of Medicine, Asturias, Spain. In 2019, Dr Neira was nominated as one of the world’s most influential people in climate policy, her work has been recognized in raising awareness on health, climate and air pollution. |
Dr Adriana Blanco Marquizo, Head of the FCTC Secretariat | On March 2020, Dr Adriana Blanco Marquizo, from Uruguay, took office as the new Head of the Secretariat of the WHO FCTC. Dr Blanco Marquizo is a medical doctor with a master’s degree in policies to Prevent Addictions in Children and Adolescents. She actively participated in tobacco control activities in her home country Uruguay, which contributed to Uruguay becoming the first smoke-free country in the region of the Americas. Before joining the Secretariat of the WHO FCTC, Dr Blanco Marquizo worked as Chief of the Risk Factors and Nutrition Unit in the Department of Noncommunicable Diseases and Mental Health at the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO). Over the past two decades, Dr Blanco Marquizo has worked in the region of the Americas, supporting tobacco control activities in many countries of the region. |
Andy Rowell, Panellist | Andy Rowell is a senior Research Fellow at the Tobacco Control Research Group at the University of Bath, which is a partner in the global tobacco industry watchdog STOP. He has been writing on environmental and health issues, including the tobacco industry for over 25 years. |
Kevin Genga, Panelist | Kevin Genga is an environmentalist, tobacco-free farms activist and inventor. A national of Kenya, Mr Genga supports environmental conservation of land, forests and rivers in Migori County. Most recently, he has been involved in an alternative livelihood to tobacco growing project, dubbed “Tobacco-Free Farms”. Mr Genga is committed to improving health and protecting the environment in his community. |
Dianita Sugiyo, Panellist | Dianita Sugiyo is the Vice Director of Muhammadiyah Steps (previously known as Muhammadiyah Tobacco Control Centre-MTCC), a research center under Research and Innovation Institute, Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta (UMY), Indonesia. Dianita is also a Lecturer of Public Health Nursing in the School of Nursing, UMY and a member of Muhammadiyah Tobacco Control Network in the country. Together with the team, she has been working on tobacco control advocacy in Indonesia since 2012. Currently, Dianita is taking her PhD program at Johann Wolfgang Goethe Universität, Frankfurt, Germany, majoring at pre-natal diagnostic on in utero smoking exposure among on pregnant mothers. |
Raquel Fernández Megina, Panellist | Raquel Fernández Megina has a degree in Journalism and has been the president of Nofumadores.org since 2005 which is like her brainchild. Raquel has devoted a good deal of her time to develop this idea to empower citizens to protect their right to a smoke free environment. She started to coordinate a small group of passionate people from every corner of Spain with, virtually, zero resources. Over the years, these people have contributed decisively to make sure that, at least, there is some accountability for Big Tobacco and Lawmakers not willing to advance or enforce Anti-Smoking laws in Spain. The proposals that Nofumadores.org brought to all parliamentary groups to include them in their amendments to the tobacco bill proposal in 2010 were taken into account to the point that some of them were integrated into the law with the same wording as the association proposed. Under her leadership Nofumadores.org has been sort of a Watchdog, asking the different administrations from Spain to abide by their own laws, being especially active against the association between the Big Owners of Bars and Restaurants & the Tobacco industry. Perhaps, one of the key accomplishments is a systematic approach to denounce clusters of fraud. At the present time Nofumadores.org, led by Raquel, continues to work and engage with Spanish law makers to advance the agenda of a smoke free future makers to advance the agenda of a tobacco and nicotine free future, using the ENDGAME 2030 declaration as its main roadmap. |
 Emmanuelle Beguinot, Panellist
| Emmanuelle Béguinot is the Director of the Comité National Contre le Tabagisme, CNCT, French national committee for tobacco control and was recipient of the the WHO award in 2016 for her involvement in the fight against smoking. The CNCT is the first NGO in France specialized and involved in the prevention and the protection of people regarding the damages due to tobacco and its industry. The association conducts studies, experimental projects and awareness-raising activities on all the harmful effects of tobacco, as well as advocacy activities to ensure that strong protection measures are adopted and respected. In this respect, the association is particularly involved in the FCTC article 5.3 for the protection of public policies and regularly takes legal action against tobacco manufacturers at the origin of a major case law. |
 Oluwafemi Mathew Akinbode, Panellist
| Oluwafemi Mathew Akinbode is the Executive Director of Corporate Accountability and Public Participation Africa (CAPPA), a civil society organization working to advance human rights, challenge corporate abuse of natural resource while building community power for inclusive development and participatory governance. Oluwafemi, has over two decades experience in grassroot organising, policy advocacy and building strong coalitions. Before founding CAPPA, the Deputy Executive Director of Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth, Nigeria (ERA) — Nigeria’s foremost environmental rights advocacy group. Oluwafemi has been involved at various capacities in tobacco control initiatives in the African region and beyond. He heads the Our Water, Our Right Africa Coalition which has been campaigning to prevent the privatization of water in Lagos and helps build the movement for public water in Africa. He is a winner of the Bloomberg Award for Global Tobacco Control. Before joining ERA/FoEN, he was a journalist with The Guardian, Nigeria’s leading national newspaper. As a journalist, he participated actively in the press freedom struggles during the despotic rule of the late General Sani Abacha. Oluwafemi is on the board of several national and international non-profit organisations. They include Board President, Africa Tobacco Control Alliance (ATCA) , Board Chair , Health of Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF) and Board Chair , Corporate Accountability among others. |
Cristina Gómez-Chacón Galán, Panelist | Since March 2016, Cristina has been working in the Ministry of Health of Spain, General Directorate of Public Health, as a Technical Advisor responsible for the Tobacco Prevention and Control Unit. She has participated in the development of health policy and the guidelines of application at the national level, coordinating with the action plans of the Autonomous Regions. She has also participated in national legislation, the latest amendment to the Law 28/2005, of December 26, on health measures against smoking in 2017 and the Royal Decree 579/2017, which transposes Directive 2014/40/EU, on tobacco products and related products. From 2006 to 2016 she held the position of Chief Technical Advisor of the Inspection Area of Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP) and Good Laboratory Practices (GLP) in the Department of Inspection and Control of Medicines With a long history of working internationally, she is currently a member of the European Commission's Group on Tobacco Control Policy and its different working groups, such as the Group on Electronic Cigarettes and Ingredients of Tobacco Products. She is a focal point in the Ministry of Health of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (WHO FCTC-WHO) and has participated in different Conferences of the Parties COP7, COP8 and COP9 representing the Ministry of Health. |
Dr Armando Peruga, Moderator