Marta Lomazzi

• PhD
• Executive at World Federation of Public Health Associations

The tobacco industry has been influencing public opinion and disrupting health policy through sophisticated and deceptive methods for decades. As evidence has mounted supporting the undisputed deadly effects of tobacco products, corporations have found ways to remain profitable. They have succeeded in attracting enough new smokers to support indust...

Introduction: The use of e-cigarettes has grown in popularity worldwide. From their manufacturing, use, and disposal, the environmental impacts of e-cigarettes present a novel public health concern that needs to be urgently investigated. However, very limited studies have focused on the subject matter. The present study aims to review available stu...

Background Advocacy is one of the core functions of public health and is a key tool for achieving Sustainable Development Goals. Public health associations play a key role in advocating for the development and implementation of strategies to prevent diseases and promote health and well-being. Objective This study aims to map out the focus of publi...

Background: It is time for a game-changer in the cancer pathway in Switzerland and around the world. COVID-19 has made this more evident than ever. The prevalence, complexity, and cost of cancer care are increasing in Switzerland. Losses in efficiency, resources, and inappropriate attribution hinder health outcomes. This study examined opportuniti...

In late 2020 and early 2021, with the eagerly anticipated regulatory approval of vaccines against SARS-CoV-2, the urgent global effort to inoculate populations against this devastating virus was underway. These case studies examine the early stages of COVID-19 vaccine rollouts across nine regions from around the world (Brazil, India, Indonesia, Ire...

The World Health Organisation (WHO), European Commission (EC) and Public Health England (PHE) published evidence of inappropriate content, marketing and labelling of commercial foods for infants and young children. Despite this, EC regulations are not yet established. To reduce rates of noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) a better understanding of the...

The theme of the 8th edition of the Geneva Health Forum (GHF) was Improving access to health: learning from the field. While 'the field' often denotes people , patients, communities, and healthcare workers, we challenge the notion and its usage. A group of like-minded conference participants set up a working group to examine the term 'the field' an...

Introduction Untreated dental caries is the most frequent childhood chronic disease worldwide. Silver diamine fluoride (SDF) offers a safe and effective alternative treatment, especially for children. Objective To inform the dental community about the efficacy of SDF in community dental caries programs and to advocate for its use as an affordable...

M. Lomazzi will give an overview of the on-going vaccination advocacy activities and policies by the World Federation of Public Health Associations.

Background Prevalence, complexity and costs of cancer care are increasing in Switzerland. Losses in efficiency, resources and inadequate attribution hamper health outcomes. This study investigated possibilities for improvement across the whole cancer path, with a special focus on patients-care provider communication and effective approaches to stre...

Background Vaccination saves countless lives worldwide. However, a gap in accessibility to and acceptability of vaccines is observed locally and globally. This gap must be addressed through a combined intersectoral approach that takes into account different social, economic, political and environmental aspects of vaccination. In addition, a compreh...

Longitudinal and observational studies have found a link between the consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) and non-communicable diseases (NCDs) including obesity and diabetes. Following World Health Organization (WHO) recommendations, SSB taxes have been implemented in over 40 countries and cities to reduce sugar consumption. Despite cont...

Aims The first aim was to describe the energy, carbohydrate and sugar contents of formula milk products in eleven countries. The second was to assess the labelling methods used. Based on the findings, approaches to facilitate the selection of infant-appropriate formula milk products were proposed. Background Consumption of excess sugar during infan...

M. Lomazzi will focus on the SBB example and the need to increase integration of oral and public health to rise the success of interventions.

Non-communicable diseases, the slow motion disaster, represent one of the main global threats to health in the 21st century. Overweight and obesity are major risk factors for a number of chronic diseases and obesity has nearly tripled since 1975. Obesity can be prevented through healthy food, healthy lifestyle and anti-obesogenic environments. Effe...

We call on dental health professionals to advocate for the integration of oral health promotion into public health, and argue that a campaign for revenue from SSB taxation to be used for oral health promotion is a good place to start. The impact of sugar on health centres on obesity, diabetes and dental caries; these also have a disproportionate im...

Infographic to summarise our viewpoint titled: Implementation of a sugar-sweetened beverage tax in low-and middle-income countries: recommendations for policymakers. The viewpoint will be published in the Journal of Public Health Policy.

Background: When microorganisms (such as bacteria or viruses) are highly exposed to antimicrobial drugs, they can develop the capacity to defeat the drugs designed to eradicate them. Long-term accumulation of adaptations to survive drug exposure can lead to the development of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). The success of antibiotics has led to th...

Due to an unfortunate oversight the article title “Switzerland, a haven for the tobacco industry” has been omitted.

Oral diseases are a neglected epidemic affecting all ages globally and can substantially impact overall health and well-being. Even though most oral diseases are preventable and share major risk factors with other non-communicable diseases, integration of oral health into public health systems is still limited in both clinical and health policy per...

The new sugar tax was recently announced by Government, aiming to combat obesity through investment in school sports. Dental professionals should seize this rare opportunity to raise awareness of the other adverse effects of sugar; young children continue to suffer alarmingly high rates of dental cavities in the UK. A significant amount of money ra...

The World Federation of Public Health Associations' Oral Health Working Group (WFPHA OHWG) carried out a survey to establish the extent of global dental public health (DPH) capacity. Senior stakeholders in DPH completed 124 surveys, covering 73 countries and all WHO regions. The survey evaluated DPH workforce within the country, funding, education,...

Global public health as a concept needs examination. Given that the use of the term has become so common, across such broad topics, it is worthwhile to take stock, review and evaluate how it is being used. In an ever‐changing and increasingly globalised context, how should global public health be understood and how should it adapt? We conducted a l...

### Growth, development, equity and stability Political leaders increasingly perceive health as being crucial to achieving growth, development, equity and stability throughout the world. Health is now understood as a product of complex and dynamic relations generated by numerous determinants at different levels of governance. Governments need to t...

Background Global public health today faces new challenges and is impacted by a range of actors from within and outside state boundaries. The diversity of the actors involved has created challenges and a complex environment that requires a new context-tailored global approach. The World Federation of Public Health Associations has embarked on a col...

Background: There have been various consultations on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by different groups. However, even if it is clear that the health sector has led the development success of the MDGs, only a few MDG reports consider public health experts' points of view and these are mainly government driven. Designs: The World Federat...

Improved treatments for early breast cancer have led to a significant increase in overall survival. While evidence regarding potential long-term sequelae of adjuvant treatments exists, relatively little research reports patients' own perceptions of change before and after adjuvant chemotherapy (AC). This study aimed to identify key ongoing issues a...

http://www.globalhealthaction.net/index.php/gha/article/view/23694 The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are eight international development goals to be achieved by 2015 addressing poverty, hunger, maternal and child mortality, communicable disease, education, gender inequality, environmental damage and the global partnership. Most activities wo...

Available at: http://www.globalhealthaction.net/index.php/gha/issue/current

The World Federation of Public Health Associations executed a quali-quantitative survey to explore the opinion of public health professionals worldwide and their experience concerning the implementation and achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) with a focus on sub-Saharan Africa. We received 427 completed questionnaires from 71 cou...

Public health covers several fields ranging from maternal/child health to the control of tobacco use and to health policy development. The importance of every single topic may vary from country to country. The World Federation of Public Health Associations (WFPHA) comprises member associations from all over the world. This allows for a study of PH...

Supplemental Methods S1. Eleven items coded (by two independent observers): "Colon cancer", "Swiss Cancer League", "Involvement of a pharmacy", "5 a day", "Genetics", "Screening", "Early symptoms", "Physical activities", "Fruits and vegetables", "Overweight" and "Advertising". These items have been chosen as they represent important key terms of th...

Health campaigns are frequently covered by printed media, but coverage is not homogeneous across different types of newspapers. Switzerland as a multilinguistic country with many newspapers offers a good field for study. A better understanding of how printed media report on national campaigns against colon cancer in the three main linguistic region...

Regulator of G-protein signaling (RGS) proteins are strong modulators of G-protein-mediated pathways in the nervous system. One function of RGS proteins is to accelerate the activation-deactivation kinetics of G-protein-coupled inwardly rectifying potassium (GIRK) channels. The opening of GIRK channels reduces the firing rates of neurons. Recent st...

Agonists of GABA(B) receptors exert a bi-directional effect on the activity of dopamine (DA) neurons of the ventral tegmental area, which can be explained by the fact that coupling between GABA(B) receptors and G protein-gated inwardly rectifying potassium (GIRK) channels is significantly weaker in DA neurons than in GABA neurons. Thus, low concent...