No Smoking Day: March 9th
The Today Is The Day website is live to help smokers hoping to switch to vaping or quit on March 9th, national No Smoking Day
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by Dave Cross
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The toolkit created by Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) and Breathe 2025 provides:
- Information about the campaign content
- Campaign aims and key messages
- Links to assets to support local amplification work
- Templates for social media, emails, websites and local PR
Organisers say: “For many years, activity for national No Smoking Day was co-ordinated by the charity of the same name, until it closed in 2011. The British Heart Foundation continued to co- ordinate activity for a period afterwards. Although there used to be national co-ordination, it was always a locally led campaign, with people finding inspiring ways to engage their smokers locally.
“To better support people to do this Breathe 2025 in Yorkshire and The Humber and Action on Smoking and Health came together last year to support a co-ordinated set of messages and assets alongside other regional and national partners. In 2022 we are doing this again building on the success of last year.”
This year, they are utilising a website set up by Breathe 2025 to store all the assets for the campaign: www.todayistheday.co.uk.
Key messages for smokers
- Don’t give up on giving up. Every time you try, you’re a step closer to success.
- Every successful quit begins with a serious quit attempt. Make your next quit attempt this No Smoking Day.
- Many smokers do not quit on their first attempt and need several tries before they succeed.
- The sooner you stop the greater the health gains but whenever you stop your health will benefit.
- Getting support really boosts your chances of quitting - you’re up to three times as likely to succeed.
Unfortunately, the material is quite light when it comes to electronic cigarettes. On vaping, organisers say: “Many people find vaping products help them successfully stop smoking. Also known as e-cigarettes they have been shown to be effective. While not risk-free, vaping is much less harmful than continuing to smoke. Vaping products are available in supermarkets and pharmacists and you can buy online from specialist shops. Find a vape supplier. For more information on e-cigarettes see the nhs.uk.”
No reference to vaping is made in any of the social media or text templates and given that e-cigs are the country’s most popular route to quit smoking this has to rank as a missed opportunity.
References:
- Today Is The Day, national No Smoking Day - https://www.todayistheday.co.uk/
Dave Cross
Journalist at POTVDave is a freelance writer; with articles on music, motorbikes, football, pop-science, vaping and tobacco harm reduction in Sounds, Melody Maker, UBG, AWoL, Bike, When Saturday Comes, Vape News Magazine, and syndicated across the Johnston Press group. He was published in an anthology of “Greatest Football Writing”, but still believes this was a mistake. Dave contributes sketches to comedy shows and used to co-host a radio sketch show. He’s worked with numerous start-ups to develop content for their websites.
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