Regional workshop to advance NCD prevention and control in the WHO South-East Asia Region
The Regional Workshop on Advancing NCD Prevention and Control in the WHO South-East Asia Region, “From Strategy to Action: Prioritizing NCD Prevention and Control,” will be held in Jaipur, India, from 28 to 30 October 2025. The hybrid workshop will bring together senior government officials and programme managers responsible for cardiovascular diseases, NCD risk factor control, and cancer prevention and management, along with representatives from academia, research institutions, professional bodies, and WHO technical staff from country offices and the Regional Office.
The workshop will aim to translate strategic commitments into actionable steps to advance the implementation of the SEAHEARTS initiative and the Regional Strategy for Comprehensive Cancer Prevention and Management (2024–2030). Participants will review progress on hypertension and diabetes management, tobacco and dietary risk reduction, and cancer control efforts, while developing national roadmaps to accelerate progress towards the SEAHEARTS 2030 milestones.
Over the three days, participants will engage in plenary discussions, technical sessions, and group exercises to strengthen programmatic implementation, monitoring, and accountability.
Key sessions will focus on:
- Day 1: Hypertension and diabetes treatment coverage and control, including overcoming challenges in medicine and technology access, promoting use of statins and single-pill combinations, and expanding HbA1c testing at the primary care level.
- Day 2: Tobacco control and unhealthy diets, including operationalizing the Regional Strategic Framework for combating smokeless tobacco, novel nicotine products, and areca nut use (2025–2030), as well as population salt reduction and trans-fat elimination strategies.
- Day 3: Comprehensive cancer prevention and management, leveraging global initiatives such as the Cervical Cancer Elimination Initiative, Global Breast Cancer Initiative, and Global Initiative for Childhood Cancer, followed by discussions on the Framework for Monitoring SEAHEARTS 2030 milestones.
By the conclusion of the workshop, participants will have:
- Developed national roadmaps to guide translation of WHO technical packages and regional strategies into country-level action.
- Identified priority interventions for tobacco control, salt reduction, and trans-fat elimination, tailored to national contexts.
- Defined national priority actions to accelerate implementation of the regional cancer strategy.
- Agreed on a monitoring framework for SEAHEARTS 2030 milestones, integrating routine health information systems and digital dashboards.
The workshop will reinforce collective commitment to advancing NCD prevention and control in the Region, aligning with the goals of SDG 3.4 and the Global NCD Action Plan. Countries will present their finalized national targets and roadmaps during the next Regional Committee session, and progress will be reviewed in 2026, 2028, and 2030.