Dear colleagues,

So we have finally met again during the 18th IFCPC congress in Cartagena, Colombia. The Congress was a great success in terms of the number of participants, the quality of scientific communications and by the participation of experts from all continents: Latino America, United States, Africa, Asia (India, China, Japan…), Australia & Europe.

It was an opportunity to discuss recent progress in the fight against cervical cancer and against lesions induced by Human Papilloma Viruses (HPV) of the lower genital tract. Many challenges still remain immense due to regional inequalities in access to care, social, economic and societal organizational systems.

The goal of a federation like the IFCPC is to help scientific exchanges, promote teaching and facilitate human contacts (so essential for communication) between health actors from different regions of the world in order to improve the transmission of knowledge and techniques.

The next 19th World Congress which will be held in Paris in June 2026.

Meanwhile, in order to maintain these contacts between us the IFCPC will provide:

• regular webinars in each region of the world organized by national or regional colposcopic societies or federations.
• remote colposcopy teaching in 3 languages (English, French and Spanish) followed by local training by teachers validated by the IFCPC (Distance Learning course, the details of which you can find on the IFCPC and IARC websites)
• a major Pan African congress to fight cervical cancer which will be held in Abidjan in Cote d’Ivoire from October 16 to 18, 2024 also supported by SAGO, AFOG, AORTIC, IGCS and FIGO
• scientific informations: scientific power points, technical videos and recommendations on our website

We will need everyone's energy to join our efforts with the IFCPC to improve our knowledge and fight effectively against cervical cancer and HPV infections. I look forward to working with you during the next 3 years.

Best regards

Jean-luc Mergui

IFCPC President