Gruesome ads that work

THERE is limited value in telling smokers that their deadly habit may kill them. They already know that, yet most ignore the warnings. But showing smokers gruesome images of people who have been maimed or disfigured by tobacco seems to have a much bigger effect.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is starting the second round of an advertising campaign featuring images such as a throat cancer survivor who rasps out her words through a small speaker in a hole in her neck. The first round of advertising, which ran for 12 weeks last year, energised large numbers of people to try quitting. The national hot line posted in the ads received about 365,000 calls, more than twice the total in the same period the year before. A smoking cessation website got 630,000 unique visits, five times the year before. About 20% of the people who call quit lines are successful in quitting for good.

This year’s campaign will cost $48m, an important counterweight to the industry’s marketing juggernaut. New York City, April 9