Lessons from the Who's Framework Convention on Tobacco Control: An advocacy-based approach for applying legal precedents that challenged big tobacco to challenge the food industry and reverse diet-related disease

In 2003, the World Health Organization adopted the groundbreaking public health and corporate accountability treaty known as the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC). When fully implemented, the FCTC will save hundreds of millions of lives. However, the FCTC's impact is not limited to its lifesaving measures. The treaty has demonstrated the important role of legal action to effectively challenge other industries that threaten public health, including the food industry, which is driving the epidemic of diet-related disease worldwide. This presentation will assert that the legal precedent set by the FCTC can be successfully used to combat diet-related disease at both the international and local levels, drawing on the examples of the 2010 San Francisco Healthy Meals Ordinance and the efforts by many local communities and countries to curb junk food marketing to children. The presentation will also highlight the growing movement towards creating an international food and health treaty similar to the FCTC in the coming years.