Impact of promotion of the Great American Smokeout and availability of over-the-counter nicotine medications, 1996.

The 1996 Great American Smokeout (GASO), sponsored by the American Cancer Society (ACS), was held on November 21 and included a national promotional campaign in collaboration with a distributor of over-the-counter (OTC) nicotine medications. The 1996 GASO was the first to use a national promotion that included paid advertising of the GASO through television, magazines, and newspapers; direct-to-consumer promotions; and educational activities about GASO in retail stores that sell OTC nicotine medications. To estimate the impact of this promotional partnership between ACS and a distributor of OTC nicotine medications on smoking-cessation activity, the collaborators analyzed data from three sources. This report summarizes the findings, which suggest that the promotional campaign, combined with OTC availability of nicotine medications, encouraged smoking-cessation activity.