Overview

Taking place on World No Tobacco Day (31 May), this live discussion focused on current and emerging issues related to smoking and COVID-19.

A panel of experts discussed key areas, including:

• Evidence for increased susceptibility of smokers to COVID-19
• COVID-19 and the interference of the tobacco industry
• Smoking cessation - perspectives from low- and middle-income countries

Panel

• Jonathan Grigg, Chair of the ERS Tobacco Control Committee
• Linnea Hedman, Member of the ERS Tobacco and Control Committee
• Sukhwinder Sohal, Head of the Respiratory Translational Research Group and Senior Lecturer in Laboratory Medicine at the University of Tasmania
• Tom Hird, Research Fellow with the Tobacco Control Research Group at the University of Bath
• Richard van Zyl-Smit, Deputy Head of the Division of Pulmonology at Groote Schuur Hospital, Cape Town