TY - JOUR T1 - <em>Tobacco control</em> at twenty: reflecting on the past, considering the present and developing the new conversations for the future JF - Tobacco Control JO - Tob Control SP - 74 LP - 76 DO - 10.1136/tobaccocontrol-2012-050447 VL - 21 IS - 2 AU - Ruth E Malone AU - Kenneth E Warner Y1 - 2012/03/01 UR - http://tobaccocontrol.bmj.com/content/21/2/74.abstract N2 - This issue marks a milestone: 2 decades of publication for Tobacco Control, which began publishing in 1992 as the only journal focused primarily on the topic. Our 20th anniversary issue invites the tobacco control community to reflect, analyse achievements and challenges, and further articulate our collective global vision of a tobacco-free future that would spare the suffering and early death of millions. Major achievements of the last 20 years make new conversations possible. Major remaining (and emerging) challenges make these new conversations essential.Had a veteran tobacco control policy researcher or advocate hibernated in 1992 and awakened today—let's call him Rip Van Tobacco—he would not believe the world of tobacco control his eyes beheld in 2012. Rip would quickly learn that the workplaces of 46 entire countries were 100% smoke-free, including all restaurants and bars, led in 2004 by cigarette- and pub-loving Ireland.1 Engaging in some simple web research—using technologies virtually unheard of in 1992—he would find that literally millions of previously secret documents from the tobacco industry are available for anyone to read at the touch of their fingertips. Indeed, he would learn of an entirely new field of tobacco control research known as tobacco industry documents research, documenting in detail tobacco companies' efforts to thwart regulation and deceive the public about the disease effects of their products: research that formed the basis for public and private lawsuits against the industry in the USA and elsewhere.Our mythical tobacco control professional would be shocked to learn that there was a global tobacco control treaty—the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC)—that had been ratified by 174 countries and was actively moving low- and middle-income countries—not just high-income nations—to create smoke-free public places, restrict tobacco advertising and promotion, and raise tobacco product taxes to unheard-of levels.i He would marvel at … ER -