Dear Public Health Specialists, Academicians, Residents, and Professionals,

We have identified the main theme of this year’s congress as “Local Authorities and Public Health”. The year 2024, has been a year in which all local components, from provincial and district municipalities to village headmen, have stood out due to the local administration elections held in March. All local authorities, especially municipalities, are gaining great importance in our country. One of the reasons for this is that local administrations have great responsibilities and duties in terms of public health services. Local administrations have many public health related duties, from drinking water to playgrounds, and marketplaces to cemeteries. On the other hand, practices such as the provision of free HPV vaccine by some municipalities have recently drawn attention. For this reason, in this year’s congress, we will try to address and discuss the increasing importance of local administrations in terms of public health in Türkiye.

However, undoubtedly, many public health problems remain important in the world and in our country. The tragedy in Gaza continues with all its burning moments, in the proximity to the geography we live in, with nearly fifty thousand people losing their lives, close to a hundred thousand injured, and destroyed settlements. What is more important than the silence of the countries that claim to be the cradle of humanity, freedom and democracy in the face of this catastrophe is the fact that the countries financing the bombing of thousands of people are the same countries. Jean-Paul Sartre expressed this hypocrisy by saying “Our noble souls are racist.”

Two major problems persist in our country: First, after the earthquakes we experienced in Kahramanmaraş on 6 February 2023, it has once again become evident how inadequate we are in the stages of preparation for disaster situations and after disasters. After a period of 1.5 years, we see that the inadequacies in public health services continue. The other major problem is the collapse of immigration policies in our country. Our country is about to face severe social crises on top of the economic crisis.

But despite all our problems, we remain hopeful as always! In “The Midnight Library”, Matt Haig deals with life through a library metaphor and brings all the lives we regret and want to live again to us as a new book. Matt Haig concludes his novel with the message “Live and keep learning, life is a whole”. That is why we focus not only on bad events, but also on successes, as in good local administration examples, and we continue to maintain hope.

In this context, we invite everyone, who is committed to public health, to the 8th International and 26th National Congress of Public Health, which we will organize in Ankara between 5th -7th December 2024. We wish to be together in the rich scientific environment of our congress consisting of conferences, panels, paper presentations, group studies and various courses, to discuss problems and solutions, to share our studies and experiences, and to be able to meet face to face.