{"id":33248,"date":"2015-01-30T12:39:07","date_gmt":"2015-01-30T11:39:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/?p=33248"},"modified":"2015-01-30T12:39:07","modified_gmt":"2015-01-30T11:39:07","slug":"the-bmj-today-are-public-health-campaigns-a-waste-of-money","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/2015\/01\/30\/the-bmj-today-are-public-health-campaigns-a-waste-of-money\/","title":{"rendered":"The BMJ Today: Are public health campaigns a waste of money?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"tom_m_sep\"<\/a>As pressure to squeeze costs rises across the whole NHS, the increasing prominence of\u00a0government funded public health campaigns is coming under greater scrutiny.<\/p>\n

Chris Mahoney has taken a look<\/a> at how doctors and the public can know whether public\u00a0health campaigns work. In a feature on The BMJ<\/em> this week, he asks whether these campaigns\u00a0offer good value for money, and who takes home the profits from the money spent on them.<\/p>\n

Mahoney finds that the success of many campaigns is often measured in website hits, social\u00a0media activity, and raised awareness of issues. However, the effect of these campaigns on\u00a0people\u2019s actual behaviour is less well studied. \u201cOnly 1% of peer reviewed papers that looked\u00a0at the impact of marketing campaigns assessed behavioural, rather than attitudinal changes,\u201d\u00a0he says.<\/p>\n

This is a crucial part of the jigsaw that is missing, because we need to know if public health\u00a0campaigns work and whether they offer good value for money. If these campaigns do work,\u00a0we may need to run more of them, and we may need to divert money from less cost effective\u00a0interventions. If they do not work, we should stop funding them and find better ways to\u00a0improve public health.<\/p>\n

A report in The BMJ<\/em> of a study<\/a> published in the latest edition of Stroke serves to emphasise\u00a0the continuing importance of improving public health. The study followed twins for more\u00a0than 40 years and found that drinking more than two alcoholic drinks each day in middle age\u00a0is associated with a greater increase in stroke risk than traditional risk factors such as high\u00a0blood pressure and diabetes.<\/p>\n

Tom Moberly<\/strong> is editor, <\/em>BMJ Careers. Follow Tom on Twitter, @tommoberly<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As pressure to squeeze costs rises across the whole NHS, the increasing prominence of\u00a0government funded public health campaigns is coming under greater scrutiny. Chris Mahoney has taken a look at […]<\/p>\n

More…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5750],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33248","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-bmj-today"],"yoast_head":"\nThe BMJ Today: Are public health campaigns a waste of money? - The BMJ<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/2015\/01\/30\/the-bmj-today-are-public-health-campaigns-a-waste-of-money\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The BMJ Today: Are public health campaigns a waste of money? - The BMJ\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"As pressure to squeeze costs rises across the whole NHS, the increasing prominence of\u00a0government funded public health campaigns is coming under greater scrutiny. 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