The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), along with other health practitioners, agrees that smoking is a leading cause of preventable death and disease in the United States. However, efforts from these groups are still not enough to discourage people from taking up the vice. That's why the CDC took it to the next level when it launched its anti-smoking campaign in the hopes of getting smokers to quit and discourage others from even trying.
Called "Tips from Former Smokers," (Tips) the campaign features real people who suffered from long term smoking-related diseases, as well as non-smokers whose health also suffered because of secondhand smoke.
The people who participated in the Tips campaign range from the average Joes and Janes to those who enjoy careers in white-collar fields.
"Really cigarettes are simply a slow, painful poisoning that you're doing to yourself and if you think you're attached to cigarettes, just wait until you're attached to oxygen... This has to go with me everywhere or I don't get to continue to live," 54 year old attorney, Becky Herner, shared. She began smoking at the age of 16.
Kristy is a truck driver who had a lot of time on her hands to smoke but she finally quit after the habit took a toll on her body. "I knew I had to quit. So, for six months, I used e-cigarettes. Then I stopped. But the whole time, I kept smoking regular cigarettes, right up until my lung collapsed. My tip is, just cutting down on cigarettes isn't enough," she recounted. She also said she experienced shortness of breath and had smoker's cough.
CDC Director Dr. Thomas Frieden believes that the effectiveness of the campaign is mostly due to its humanizing factor. People can easily shrug off photos of real damaged internal organs and actual statistics. What makes CDC's campaign different is that people - especially smokers - now get to see the effects and hear real-life stories from those who suffered from their smoking habit and who regret that they did not quit when they had a chance to.
Watch the campaign below:
