Best Practices [antikvár]

A WELCOME WISH TO THE CONFERENCE I am very pleased to stand here next to Mr. President Martti Ahtisaari as a parton of this conference and pay my tribute to you. The goal you have set today touches us all, although we, who are in good health, do not always bring the question of health into our con- sciousness. The reason is quite simple. During my 70 years of life, the way in which people perceive life has changed beyond recognition. The population of the world has increased from 2 to 6 billion. The growth rate of the population is even more abrupt in cities located in less opulent countries than our own, which we, deceiving ourselves, call "developing". Increasingly, we are withdrawing from the natural environment that for millenniums has formed us, and are becoming artificial. However, we do not fully comprehend the positive and negative effects of the environment on people. The science of health has successfully repelled diseases that, in my childhood, were lethal. However, these have been replaced by yet others that were unfamiliar to people in the first half of this century. Cynically, one could argue that the medical industry has formed a market and created the pretence for public claims of new epidemics for which they have developed new medications. In most countries of the world, quality and effective health promotion pro- grammes are even less available to people than daily bread and fresh water. I therefore sincerely hope that you have not entangled your- selves in details to the extent of failing to appreciate that the central points of health promotion are moral and ethical. It is a person's holy right to live and consider their basic lifestyle. Health is first and fore- most the right and obligation of every individual, albeit whether or not they are healthy or in great need. I wish the participants of the conference strength to tolerate the prob- lems of our times and courage to acknowledge that the world is not incurable.