If you follow our news, you could not miss the famous intervention of the biologist Nicolas Donze which moreover disappeared only a few hours after our publication. Well, the program of which he is a part which bears the name “I quit smoking” is setting up all over Switzerland. Six French-speaking cantons, including Geneva, are therefore launching a smoking cessation program thanks to Facebook.
From March 20, prevention circles in six French-speaking cantons will launch a smoking cessation program thanks to Facebook. The concept is based on two pillars: taking advantage of the social network to disseminate advice and provide support to candidates to quit smoking; but also and above all create a virtual community where participants encourage each other and share their experiences on a daily basis. The organizers hope to motivate between 4000 and 6000 participants during 6 months.
The project, tested since last September in Valais, gives very promising results. After three months, more than half of the participants have not resumed smoking. The Confederation is closely following the experience. The Tobacco Prevention Fund will inject 600 francs into the Romand project. For its director, Peter Blatter, it is a model of the future. He is answering our questions.
Peter Blatter, the Confederation will finance a large part of the Romand project. What interests you in this experience ?
Two factors really impressed us. First there is the huge success in terms of participants. The Valais pilot project brought together 1000 participants. This is significantly more than with a standard tobacco control campaign. And above all, with this program, we take smokers who intend to quit smoking as partners and not as mere targets of our intervention. And that changes completely. Until now, this had never been done - or at least never in Switzerland.
You didn't even wait for the end of the pilot project to get started. Why such enthusiasm ?
This project has gained such momentum that I would have found it a shame to stop this momentum. This is why we have decided to take advantage of this dynamic, without waiting to have all the answers to our questions. The Prevention Fund considers this project in Romandie as a pilot project and we are going to carry out the evaluation ourselves, directly, in order to better understand the mechanisms of success.
This means that you are already thinking about extending the project to the whole of Switzerland. ?
Not yet. I really want concrete, stable results.
You commit 600 francs to the project. What does this represent compared to other prevention projects that you support ?
In the field of addiction, it's very cheap! Sometimes we pay thousands of francs for a single ex-smoker. In this project, we are around 100 francs per person.
Source : tdg.ch
