Camille Vigil - Woman in Graphic Smoking Ad Dies

     This Monday, Terrie Hall, the woman who became a spokesperson for a government funded anti-smoking campaign, died this Monday in North Carolina at the age of 53. She appeared in a series of commercials and ads aimed at discouraging people from smoking (or encouraging them to quit smoking), telling of her life story on how smoking completely changed the direction of her life, which ultimately led to her death.  She appeared alongside several others, though she became the most prominent, appearing in the most ads compared to the others, as part of a harsh but evidently effective campaign by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which estimates that the campaign has lead to as many as 100,000 Americans quitting smoking.

     I've seen these commercials on tv and even on youtube, and definitely get the point across of how bad smoking is for a person's health and what the consequences are. Because the commercials are short (commercials typically only last 30 seconds to about 3 minutes), I think that it very effectively sums up the terrible, terrible results of smoking in a way that maintains the viewers complete and full attention. It makes the viewers concerned about smoking by hearing the true story of a real person. These commercials were slightly controversial when they first aired, being "graphic" in that the people portrayed are suffering such harsh health issues as a result of smoking, but they also told the cold hard truth about it. I personally think these commercials were desperately needed, seeing that celebrities and our culture make smoking seem like the "cool" thing to do for young people. Anyone who thought smoking was "cool" before seeing these commercials would think otherwise afterward.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/09/17/quit-smoking-woman/2825241/