On September 19-20, 2011, world leaders will convene at the United Nations in New York for the second ever high-level meeting on a specific health issue to chart a global response to noncommunicable diseases (NCDs). These challenging diseases – cancer, cardiovascular disease, chronic respiratory disease, and diabetes – with common risk factors that include smoking, alcohol abuse, physical inactivity, and unhealthy diet, now cause 63% of all deaths globally, 90% of which occur in developing countries.
This high-level meeting has the potential to be a transformative event. Only once before in its 65-year history has the UN held such a summit on a health topic. In 2001, a high-level meeting led to an unprecedented international response to the AIDS crisis and ultimately to the creation of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.
The UN summit is an unprecedented opportunity to put cancer and other NCDs on the global health agenda. The summit has the potential to secure commitment from heads of government for a coordinated global response to cancer, substantially increase financial resources for cancer, and save millions of people from premature death and debilitating health complications. It also has the potential to lead to measurable targets and commitments from governments to take action on cancer and other NCDs, for which they can be monitored and held accountable through regular reporting.
Now is the time to take action that you believe cancer is a priority global health issue.