Trying to horrify smokers!

Health regulators have long been trying to horrify smokers and encourage them to quit by putting different types of warnings on the cigarette packs. Next in the warning series are “graphical warnings” which the experts hope would be effective in preventing tobacco use.
WHO’s call for pictorial warnings
Following the saying “a picture is worth more than words can say”, the World Health Organization (WHO) has urged the governments to put gruesome picture warnings on the cigarette packs to highlight the hazards of tobacco intake.
It is believed that the horrible pictures of rotting lungs, miscarried fetuses and bleeding brains would motivate the smokers to quit and also prevent others from picking up the habit."Today, WHO urged governments to require that all tobacco packages include pictorial warnings to show the sickness and suffering caused by tobacco use," said the Geneva-based health agency in a statement.
The mandatory graphical warnings conveying the disastrous consequences related to tobacco use to the general public will be placed on "all main faces of the pack so that the warnings will be visible no matter which side of the pack is displayed at retail."
The UN health agency asked the worldwide governments to put as shocking images on the packs as they can. "More graphic images are considered to have a greater impact and to be more likely to lead to behavioural change," it said.
Proved: Graphical warnings are effective
"Effective health warnings, especially those that include pictures, have been proven to motivate users to quit and to reduce the appeal of tobacco for those who are not yet addicted," said the agency.
Countries like Brazil, Canada, Singapore and Thailand have already been plastering picture warnings showing illnesses caused by tobacco on cigarette packs. And WHO says studies in these countries have proved that putting gruesome picture warnings on tobacco product packages significantly helps in reducing its use.
The WHO has launched its own explicit poster campaign for World No Tobacco Day on Sunday, May 31, 2009. The poster campaign combined the picture of bleeding brains with the text warning "smoking causes brain strokes" and the other picture of rotting gums comes with the warning "tobacco causes mouth diseases".
Dr. Ala Alwan, WHO’s assistant director general, said: “Health warnings on tobacco packages are a simple, cheap and effective strategy that can vastly reduce tobacco use and save lives. But they only work if they communicate the risk.
“Warnings that include images of the harm that tobacco causes are particularly effective at communicating risk and motivating behavioral changes.”However, WHO complained that nine out of 10 people in the world have no access to such warnings. It added that even among people who are aware of tobacco’s harmful consequences, few understand its specific health risks. This is why the agency’s campaign this year focuses on decreasing tobacco use by increasing public awareness of its dangers.