Tobacco Free Florida
Tobacco Free Florida is an anti-smoking organization based in the U.S. state of Florida, administered by the Florida Department of Health.
Mission
Since the founding of Tobacco Free Florida Campaign in February 2008, they have had four main programmatic goals:
- Promote cessation of tobacco use
- Prevent the initiation of tobacco use among all ages
- Eliminate secondhand smoke exposure
- Reduce tobacco-related health problems
History
Since 1989, Florida's Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services has been actively involved in the prevention of tobacco use. In 1997, Florida settled a lawsuit with a large tobacco industry and was granted $11.3 billion to assist with Medicaid costs for smokers, incurred by various health providers. As a result of the lawsuit, the Tobacco Pilot Program was launched by the Florida Department of Health to help educate youth on the harmful impacts of tobacco use. When Florida's legislation decided to reduce funding to $1 million annually five years later after the Tobacco Pilot Program was launched, Floridians passed a constitutional amendment in 2006, which requires an annual appropriation of 15% of the gross 2005 tobacco settlement fund (adjusted for inflation) to provide money for a statewide tobacco education and prevention program.
In 2007, the Zimmerman Agency was granted a $17.1 million contract to conduct a statewide social marketing, media, and public relations campaign. The Tobacco Free Florida brand was created as the department's health communication intervention component. The Tobacco Free Florida Campaign helps thousands of Floridians quit using smoke and smokeless tobacco products through the use of TV, radio, print and social media advertising. The organization operates on a budget of about $65 million per year.
Super Bowl ads
In 2010, Tobacco Free Florida purchased a package of ads for $447,992.51 to be run multiple times before, during, and after the National Football League Super Bowl championship game. The ads were created with a smoking cessation message intended to target adult smokers. A focus group was run on people who had seen the commercials and concluded that people did not care that they were at an increased risk of dying from cancer or heart disease, but they did care that every year smoking leaves 31,000 children fatherless. The overall impact of the advertisement campaign was to target adult smokers to think about their tobacco use affecting their children and family.