The Trump Administration will be presenting its anti-opioid ad campaign soon, and will take inspiration from the “This is Your Brain on Drugs” campaign launched in 1987.
The PSA campaign is the product of a partnership between the White House and the Ad Council. The goal is to “shock the conscience” of the public. A source disclosed to Axios that President Trump thinks it has to “engage and enrage.”
Trump said in March the government will oversee a “large-scale roll-out of commercials” to raise awareness about the dangers of opioids.
He said that “The best way to beat the drug crisis is to keep people from getting hooked in the first place,” and added that “This has been something I have been strongly in favor of–spending a lot of money on great commercials showing how bad it is.”
The research has estimated that the anti-smoking campaign by the Truth Initiative, which has prevented approximately 301,930 young Americans from smoking in 2015 and 2016. The national anti-drug incentives such as “Just Say No” and “This Is Your Brain on Drugs” are generally considered unsuccessful in keeping kids off drugs.
Trump is reportedly fond of the shock and awe message of these style of campaigns. Rachel Leigh Cook originally starred in an ad for “This Is Your Brain on Drugs” in 1997 and returned in 2016 with a different message, “This is your brain on the war on drugs.”
The iconic egg-in-the-frying-pan motif was brought back, this time to bring awareness to the impact the War on Drugs has on people’s lives.
Cook says in the ad that “It fuels mass incarceration. It targets people of color in greater numbers than their white counterparts. It cripples communities. It costs billions. And it doesn’t work.”
The original ad was also re-made in 2016, with a new message for a new generation. Still the egg-in-the-frying-pan motif was employed, saying “This Is Your Brain on Drugs.”
