'India needs a National Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary disease Prevention and Control Program (ICONIC)' - this was discussed at the 1st International Conference of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary disease (COPD) held at Pune. Mr Keshav Desiraju, secretary, Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, inaugurated the first conference focusing on Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary disease (COPD) in India. The conference has 18 overseas faculty and 15 national speakers which is jointly hosted by Chest Research Foundation (CRF) and Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, USA. 

Speaking at ICONIC 2014, Dr Sundeep Salvi, director, Chest Research Foundation said, "ICONIC brings together experts across the healthcare industry including physicians, public health policy makers and researchers to bridge gaps in the field of COPD prevention, control and management in India. It is an opportunity to share the latest developments in COPD research both from US and India, which they can use it to treat their patients better."

Dr Shyam Biswal, Department of Environmental Health Science, John Hopkins School of Public Health, USA, said, "ICONIC serves as a great platform for young researchers and physicians to showcase their research work and receive constructive feedback from the leading experts in the world. It will also help them to polish and shape their research studies so that they can derive meaningful and qualitative data that will benefit the world. Further, it also creates opportunities for doctors in America and India to come together to form collaborations for exchange of knowledge which will help to combat the COPD epidemic."

In India, people are aware of diseases such as cancer, diabetes, hypertension, but a condition like COPD still remains unknown to many. Further, due to lack of awareness by healthcare providers, many patients' remain poorly diagnosed and even wrongly treated.