The World Health Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations with primary
responsibility for international health matters and public health. Through this Organization,
which was created in 1948, the health professions of over 190 countries exchange their
knowledge and experience with the aim of making possible the attainment by all citizens of
the world of a level of health that will permit them to lead a socially and economically
productive life.
The WHO Regional Office for Europe is one of six regional offices throughout the world, each
with its own programme geared to the particular health problems of the countries it serves.
The European Region embraces some 870 million people living in an area stretching from
Greenland in the north and the Mediterranean in the south to the Pacific shores of the Russian
Federation. The European programme of WHO therefore concentrates both on the problems
associated with industrial and post-industrial society and on those faced by the emerging
democracies of central and eastern Europe and the former USSR. In its strategy for attaining
the goal of health for all the Regional Office is arranging its activities in three main areas:
lifestyles conducive to health, a healthy environment, and appropriate services for prevention,
treatment and care.
The European Region is characterized by the large number of languages spoken by its
peoples, and the resulting difficulties in disseminating information to all who may need it.
Applications for rights of translation of Regional Office books are therefore most welcome.