Some good news to start the year.
If you were wondering what happened to the quit smoking campaign that traditionally launches between Christmas and New Year, it was reported last week that Public Health England had axed this year's campaign.
According to the Guardian, 'The move came after PHE’s marketing budget was cut by a fifth earlier this year, from about £35m to £28m.'
Not everyone was as pleased as we were:
“Slashing budgets for these campaigns is a foolhardy decision which not only lets down smokers who are looking to quit but will also result in further pressure on the NHS due to smoking-related illnesses,” warned British Lung Foundation’s (BLF) senior policy officer Rachael Hodges.
“Although smoking rates are declining, we must not be complacent. Mass media campaigns are vital in encouraging smokers to quit and stay smoke free.”
Vital? I'm not so sure. Mass media campaigns are persistently advocated by tobacco control lobbyists such as ASH but where is the evidence they actually work?
Forest spent several years trying to get Public Health England to publish figures demonstrating the 'success' of Stoptober (a mass media campaign launched in 2012) but all we got was evasion after evasion.
Stoptober limps on but I've seen nothing to suggest it plays a significant role in persuading smokers to stop.
PHE's new year campaign must have fared even worse because if there was evidence that it encouraged a significant number of smokers to quit, do you really think they would have abandoned it?
Truth is, the 'Health Harms' initiative fell victim to the same issue that ultimately scuppers most health campaigns – warning fatigue and outrageous hyperbole.
As it happens I wrote about this five years ago following the launch of PHE's 'Stop the rot' campaign in December 2014. (See 'Public health: rotten to the core'.)
Forest's response to the initiative was reported by BBC News and the Daily Mail, among others:
"Campaigns like this are an abuse of public money. Education has been replaced by shrill scaremongering that is often counter-productive because it's human nature to switch off when you're being nagged or shouted at on an almost daily basis."
Under the headline 'Anti-smoking adverts accused of 'scaremongering'' the Independent noted that Forest had branded the campaign “poisonous” and had accused PHE of making “exaggerated claims”:
Its chief executive, Simon Clark, said that “there can’t be a sane adult in the United Kingdom who isn’t well aware of the health risks of smoking” and urged Public Health England to “engage directly with consumers” rather than using shock tactics.
Two years ago, in response to another "hard-hitting" initiative, we said:
“It wouldn't be New Year without an anti-smoking campaign designed to scare smokers to quit. The new ad is a complete waste of public money. Smokers know there are serious health risks associated with smoking. They don’t need another alarmist TV ad to remind them.”
Continuing the tactic, PHE last year produced a slick two-minute video that began with a voiceover that said:
"Every cigarette you smoke causes tar to enter your body and spread poison throughout your bloodstream, poison that can cause heart disease, cancer and stroke."
I wrote about it here (The price of appeasing PHE’s anti-smoking propaganda), pointing out that it reminded me of a previous new year campaign that declared:
"When you smoke the chemicals you inhale cause mutations on your body and mutations are how cancer starts. Every 15 cigarettes you smoke will cause a mutation. If you could see the damage you would stop."
That claim led to Forest making a formal complaint to the Advertising Standards Authority. As I reminded readers:
The procedure was long and arduous (it took 18 months) but during that time the ASA upheld Forest's complaint THREE times before the ASA Council eventually overruled its own executive following repeated appeals by the Department of Health.
Anyway, here we are in 2020 and the good news is that PHE has scrapped its new year campaign. Anti-smoking activists may claim it's because of budget cuts but my guess is it just wasn't offering value for money.