Commercial interests a barrier to promoting health in Europe, Belgium reiterates
At an event to mark World Cancer Day on 31 January 2024, Minister Vandenbroucke again emphasized the need to tackle commercial determinants, urging, "We must integrate the perspective of the commercial determinants into our discussions and start a much more open, but nuanced, discussion on the impact of private players on health." Commercial and vested interests benefiting a few have been a longstanding issue delaying NCD prevention policies that improve the health of the masses. This impact of industry harming health was reiterated by Mark Petticrew, Professor of Public Health Evaluation at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, who said, "These harmful industries profit from the harms they cause, driving high rates of mortality and morbidity and creating and profiting from inequalities. They then expect governments, the public and health services to pick up the bill. NCD prevention depends on restricting the ability of commercial actors to cause such harms, and the evidence-based polices to prevent them already exist and there is a pressing need to implement them now."
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