Non-Communicable Disease

Abstract

Abstract This chapter, “Non-Communicable Disease,” examines how non-communicable diseases (NCDs) are conceptualized and governed at the global level. In order to combat major non-communicable diseases such as cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes, and chronic respiratory disease, global health partners must work together to reduce the individual behaviors that undermine health—including tobacco use, unhealthy diets, physical inactivity, and alcohol. However, NCDs are not an epidemic of unhealthy choices made by individuals acting in isolation but a predicable consequence of physical, economic, and social environments that undermine healthy lifestyles. Globalization has led to trade liberalization, opening up new markets in low- and middle-income countries to commercial determinants of health, making global health law and policy initiatives crucial to the NCD response. While the World Health Organization (WHO) adopted a legal framework to address tobacco under the 2003 Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), global governance of NCDs occurs largely through a mosaic of WHO soft law instruments—including global strategies, action plans, and other normative instruments—with the involvement of other UN agencies broadening the NCD agenda. Strengthened global governance, by aligning law and policy standards under WHO and the UN system, will be needed to turn the tide on NCDs.