No Smoking Day:
Charity Launches 'Hijacking' App As a survey shows one in 10 smokers
are"desperate" to give up, an app is unveiled that virtually
transforms cigarette packs.
The British Heart
Foundation (BHF) has pledged to hijack cigarette packs from today - No Smoking
Day - by virtually transforming them in smokers' hands into items they could
afford if they quit.
The charity is encouraging smokers to"swap
fags for swag" by thinking about how much money they could save if they
quit.
Someone who smokes 20 cigarettes a daycould save
£7 a day, £49 a week, £210 a month and £2,555 a year if they kicked the habit,
the BHF said.
The charity has developed a new smartphone app,
Blippar, which virtually transforms a cigarette pack into a puff of smoke,
before revealing items they could afford with a week, month, or year's worth of
smoking savings.
This year's BHF No Smoking Day campaign
Betty McBride, director of policy and
communications at the BHF, said: "The tobacco giants are notoriously
protective about their slick cigarette packaging - here's a bit of slick that
does some good for once.
"We need to up our game if we are going to
help people beat their addiction to tobacco by finding new ways to reach out to
them."
The new app comes on BHF's 30th annual No
Smoking Day . A survey conducted for the 2013 campaign found that 11% of
smokers are desperate to kick the habit.
And 82% of 2,000 UK smokers surveyed had tried
and failed to quit.
Around one in five people smoke, according to
the charity, and the latest data from the World Health Organisation shows that
smoking prevalence in Europe is higher than the rest of the world.
A separate poll, conducted on 2,000 ex and
current smokers by Pru Health, found that the average smoker spends 11% of
income on tobacco.
:: Smokers who want
help in quitting are encouraged to visit wequit.co.uk
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