O.6. Practice session: How commercial determinants and conflicts of interest affect health: fossil fuels & infant formula
Abstract
Background: Commercial determinants of health (CDoH) increasingly shape population health outcomes but remain insufficiently integrated into public health practice. Fossil fuel and infant formula industries illustrate how commercial actors not only generate harmful exposures but also actively shape how health risks are defined, prioritized, and governed. This creates ongoing ethical and governance challenges for public health practice at the intersection of evidence, policy, and commercial influence.
Added value: The workshop’s added value lies in its innovative comparative design across sectors. By integrating fossil fuel governance and infant feeding within a single analytical framework, it moves beyond siloed approaches to CDoH. It highlights shared mechanisms across industries, including evidence shaping, agenda setting, policy interference, and normalisation of harmful practices. This comparative systems perspective enables identification of structural patterns of power and influence often obscured in single-sector analyses, addressing a key gap in public health training. Coherence is ensured through a unified CDoH framework supported by the Advocacy Coalition Framework, enabling structured analysis of actors, beliefs, and policy dynamics across both case studies.
Aim: This workshop aims to strengthen participants’ capacity to translate awareness of CDoH into critical analysis and action-oriented public health practice. It focuses on identifying industry strategies of influence, recognizing conflicts of interest, and strengthening ethical reflection in policy and practice contexts.
Key messages: • Commercial determinants of health shape policy across sectors. This workshop compares fossil fuels and infant formula to reveal shared mechanisms of industry influence.
• Using case-based learning, participants develop skills to identify conflicts of interest and apply analytical frameworks to address commercial influence in public health.
Speakers/Panellists: Farhang Tahzib
Faculty of Public Health, Haywards heath, UK
Angela Giusti
National Center for Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, National Institute of Health, Rome, Italy
Related
- C.7. Scientific session: Commercial determinants of health in times of war, crisis and conflict
- O.4. Scientific session: Working to address commercial determinants of health at local government level: Emerging findings
- The role of good governance in managing conflicts of interest at local level: lessons from England
- Unravelling the commercial determinants of cardiovascular risk factors in Ibadan, Nigeria: an exploratory micro-analysis
- The Commercial Determinants of Health: How Clinicians Can Make a Difference
BibTeX
@article{eupha2026practice,
title = {{O.6. Practice session: How commercial determinants and conflicts of interest affect health: fossil fuels & infant formula}},
author = {EUPHA, EUPHAnxt, EUPHA Ethics in Public Health section, EUPHA Child and Adolescent Public Health section and Farhang Tahzib and Angela Giusti},
journal = {The European Journal of Public Health},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.1093/eurpub/ckag169.367},
url = {https://doi.org/10.1093/eurpub/ckag169.367},
note = {CC BY-NC 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - O.6. Practice session: How commercial determinants and conflicts of interest affect health: fossil fuels & infant formula
AU - EUPHA, EUPHAnxt, EUPHA Ethics in Public Health section, EUPHA Child and Adolescent Public Health section
AU - Farhang Tahzib
AU - Angela Giusti
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/01
JO - The European Journal of Public Health
DO - 10.1093/eurpub/ckag169.367
UR - https://doi.org/10.1093/eurpub/ckag169.367
AB - Background: Commercial determinants of health (CDoH) increasingly shape population health outcomes but remain insufficiently integrated into public health practice. Fossil fuel and infant formula industries illustrate how commercial actors not only generate harmful exposures but also actively shape how health risks are defined, prioritized, and governed. This creates ongoing ethical and governance challenges for public health practice at the intersection of evidence, policy, and commercial influence. Added value: The workshop’s added value lies in its innovative comparative design across sectors. By integrating fossil fuel governance and infant feeding within a single analytical framework, it moves beyond siloed approaches to CDoH. It highlights shared mechanisms across industries, including evidence shaping, agenda setting, policy interference, and normalisation of harmful practices. This comparative systems perspective enables identification of structural patterns of power and influence often obscured in single-sector analyses, addressing a key gap in public health training. Coherence is ensured through a unified CDoH framework supported by the Advocacy Coalition Framework, enabling structured analysis of actors, beliefs, and policy dynamics across both case studies. Aim: This workshop aims to strengthen participants’ capacity to translate awareness of CDoH into critical analysis and action-oriented public health practice. It focuses on identifying industry strategies of influence, recognizing conflicts of interest, and strengthening ethical reflection in policy and practice contexts. Key messages: • Commercial determinants of health shape policy across sectors. This workshop compares fossil fuels and infant formula to reveal shared mechanisms of industry influence. • Using case-based learning, participants develop skills to identify conflicts of interest and apply analytical frameworks to address commercial influence in public health. Speakers/Panellists: Farhang Tahzib Faculty of Public Health, Haywards heath, UK Angela Giusti National Center for Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, National Institute of Health, Rome, Italy
SN - 1101-1262
SN - 1464-360X
ER -