The Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids is pleased to announce the winner of the 2011Judy Wilkenfeld Award for International Tobacco Control Excellence, E. Ulysses “Yul” Dorotheo.

Dr. Dorotheo is a neuro-ophthalmologist, who has been a tobacco control advocate for over ten years. Beginning as a volunteer and after co-founding the FCTC Alliance, Philippines (FCAP), he actively participated as a non-governmental observer in the early negotiations for the FCTC.  In 2006, he joined the Southeast Asia Tobacco Control Alliance (SEATCA) as its FCTC Program Manager and the Framework Convention Alliance (FCA) as its Regional Coordinator for ASEAN and the Western Pacific, roles he jointly performed till 2009.

 

Since 2010, he has been project director for SEATCA’s Southeast Asia Initiative on Tobacco Tax, a five-year project aimed primarily at raising tobacco taxes and prices in Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, the Philippines, and Vietnam.

From his early campaigning days Yul saw the need to approach tobacco control with a comprehensive approach, grounded in the FCTC and this approach has brought him to work collaboratively with NGOs, governments and international agencies and advocates. He reached out to many people from diverse backgrounds starting with the Philippines first, then internationally through the FCTC negotiations. Yul is an advocate who truly has national, regional and international reach.

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About the Judy Wilkenfeld Award

On May 24, 2007, the world lost an incomparable advocate of tobacco control.  Judy Wilkenfeld worked tirelessly to reduce tobacco’s toll for more than 20 years, first as a public official and then as a leader of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids international efforts.  Among her many accomplishments, Judy played an integral role in the development and adoption of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) and the emergence of the Framework Convention Alliance.     Her expertise and devotion forever changed the world of tobacco control. In Judy’s honor, the Campaign established the Judy Wilkenfeld Award for International Tobacco Control Excellence, which is given annually to an advocate from a low- or middle-income country who has worked to significantly reduce tobacco use through policy advocacy and exemplifies the traits for which Judy was known.

 

The Judy Wilkenfeld award will be presented at the Campaign’s annual Youth Advocates of the Year Awards Gala, which will be held on Wednesday, May 18, 2011.