A campaign from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) aims to convince smokers that it's time to quit tobacco before it steals their health.

 

On April 1, the CDC's Office of Smoking and Health launched its second round of Tips from Former Smokers, also called Tips II, a national effort to reach smokers about the health risks associated with cigarettes and secondhand smoke. The new ads will expand on the initial Tips I campaign ads by including additional population groups and health conditions. The ads will run for approximately 16 weeks.

 

Similar to the compelling ads in the first Tips campaign, the new campaign features real people suffering as a result of smoking and exposure to secondhand smoke, including Annette, 57, who was diagnosed with lung cancer at age 52; Shane, 44, diagnosed with throat cancer at age 34; and Jessica, 28, whose 7-year-old son has asthma.

 

Tips I profiled people living with the significant adverse health effects caused by smoking, such as stomas, paralysis from stroke, lung removal, heart attack, limb amputations and asthma, underscoring the immediate damage that smoking can cause to the body.

 

The new Tips campaign will help the Georgia Department of Public Health's (DPH) tobacco program raise awareness about the suffering caused by smoking and to encourage smokers in the state to quit. As with the first Tips campaign, DPH is expecting another spike in the number of calls to the Georgia Tobacco Quit Line with the launch of Tips II.

 

"We have proof that our Georgia tobacco cessation campaign, in addition to CDC's Tips campaign, added great value to reach smokers in key public health districts who called the Tobacco Quit Line for counseling," said Kimberly Redding, M.D., M.P.H., director of health promotion and disease prevention at DPH. "We saw a 400 percent increase in overall calls to the Quit Line. We expect this year to reach adult male smokers who have a higher smoking prevalence rate above the state and national rates of 21 percent."

 

DPH will have access to a robust website of comprehensive Tips II resources for content in multiple languages, including overviews of smoking-related health conditions, real stories and videos of former smokers who are featured in the ads, social media feeds and direct links to YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest. There are also resources that health care providers can use to talk to their smoking patients about quitting.

 

DPH is integrating Tips II with its own tobacco awareness campaign and will run radio public service announcements in 11 public health districts concurrently with CDC's messages. DPH's campaign will last until the Great American Smokeout in November. The department hopes the messages will encourage quit attempts and promote cessation resources.

 

According to DPH data, 11 public health districts in Georgia have smoking prevalence rates that exceed the state and national rates of 21 percent and lung cancer incidence rates that exceed Georgia's rate of 96 per 100,000. The additional promotion of the Georgia Tobacco Quit Line will occur in Waycross, Valdosta, Clayton, Rome, Savannah, Dalton, Albany, Columbus, Augusta, Dublin and LaGrange.

 

To view the Tips II ads, visit the campaign's page on the CDC's website.

 

If you or someone you know need help quitting tobacco, call the Georgia Tobacco Quit Line today at (877) 270-STOP (7867) or visit Live Healthy Georgia for free cessation counseling and available resources.