Science against smoking: the challenges for Ireland: an Irish report from the 3rd European Tobacco or Health Conference, Warsaw, Poland.

Overview Earlier this year. Europe's first Health Commissioner, our very own David Byrne, along with 24 other EU Representatives, signed the Warsaw Declaration for a tobacco-free Europe. It acknowledged that 'the tobacco epidemic is one of the greatest public health challenges facing the World Health Organisation's European region', This is a challenge that needs a joint response. Ambitiously sub-titled 'Solidarity For Health', the 3rd European Conference on Tobacco or Health (or ECTOH) in Warsaw in June sought to mobitize Europeans to action on tobacco control. With it's huge turnout of medics and other health professionals, including some of the biggest names in tobacco control worldwide, the conference represented the nuts and bolts of last February's Declaration - the how, the why and most importantly, the when. The exigency of the smoking epidemic· particularly among young women, teenagers, and even children· with all it's black· and·white, indeed life·or·death consequences. was repeatedly highlighted, and particularly eloquently by Poland's glamourous First Lady Jolanta Kwanieswska in her welcoming speech to delegates: It is saddening for me that 10,000 European children start smoking everyday. Especially horrifying, when we realize that at least half of these children will become ill because of smoking."