Tips Campaign Matte Article for Faith Communities

This prewritten matte article about the Tips From Former Smokers^® campaign is ready for adaptation and use by faith communities, journalists, bloggers, and other members of the media and for organizations’ newsletters.

CDC’s Tips From Former Smokers Campaign Airing a New Round of Hard-Hitting Commercials

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is continuing its federally funded national tobacco education campaign—Tips From Former Smokers^® (Tips^®)—with hard-hitting TV commercials that feature real people living with the health effects of smoking and secondhand smoke exposure. The Tips campaign also tells the personal stories of family members taking care of loved ones living with a smoking-related illness or disability, as they share the impact smoking has had on all their lives.

The campaign ads, which air beginning on March 6, 2023, highlight the immediate and long-term damage caused by smoking and encourage people who smoke to quit. Faith leaders across the country are also encouraging their members who smoke to quit for good so they can be around for their families, friends, and faith communities.

The Tips ads show that smoking causes a variety of severe health problems, including cancer, heart disease, and stroke. Unfortunately, even though smoking rates among adults have declined over the years—from 20.9% in 2005 to 12.5% in 2020—tobacco use still results in far too many deaths and smoking-related illnesses in the United States.

CDC launched the first Tips campaign in 2012 to lower smoking rates and save lives. From 2012–2018, CDC estimates that approximately one million people successfully quit smoking and more than 16.4 million attempted to quit because of the Tips campaign.

“Smoking doesn’t just kill; it can disable, disfigure and rob people who smoke of their independence,” said Deirdre Lawrence Kittner, PhD, MPH, director of CDC’s Office on Smoking and Health. “While some of these ads can be difficult to watch, they show the challenges that real people face every day as a result of smoking in a way that statistics cannot. By providing information, resources, and motivation, the Tips campaign has proven to be highly effective in helping people across the country quit smoking.”

For more information about the Tips campaign and resources for quitting smoking, visit CDC.gov/tips. For help quitting, call 1-800-QUIT-NOW (1-800-784-8669).

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