A suite of new No Smokes Health Worker Guides  was  launched on World No Tobacco Day (Friday, 31 May) providing a culturally relevant toolbox for health workers, including Aboriginal tobacco workers, to tackle Indigenous smoking rates.

For your convenience see quick links  below to NACCHO resources

No Smokes project leader, Associate Professor Sheree Cairney said that with Indigenous Australians smoking at more than twice the rate of their non-Indigenous counterparts, World No Tobacco Day reminds us why tackling smoking in these communities is a priority.

“We created the No Smokes Health Worker Guides to support health care workers and health educators to assess where their client is at in their ‘quit journey’, and then direct them to the No Smokes tools appropriate to that stage,” she said.

 The guides use interactive and visual online resources from the No Smokes website in combination with the latest knowledge and best practice about quitting and the harmful effects of tobacco.

The launch of the No Smokes Health Worker Guides coincides with the one year anniversary of the overarching resources NoSmokes.com.au, a multimedia anti-smoking project that uses humour, music and highly visual mediums to appeal to young Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. NoSmokes.com.au is a project of the Menzies School of Health Research and funded by the Department of Ageing.

“The No Smokes website has had almost 50,000 page views in its first year, using social media, video stories and interactive games to engage its target audience, and the health worker guides add a new dimension,” Assoc Professor Cairney said.

“The No Smokes Health Worker Guides were written by drug and alcohol addiction workers who specialise in Indigenous health settings, and are built to work within standard models of practice – the stages of change model, recovery-oriented practice, and the 5 A’s

The No Smokes Health Worker Guides are available as free PDF downloads from www.nosmokes.com.au/healthworkers and seamlessly with a range of online videos, fact sheets and downloadable music and interactive games.

 No Smokes is also holding a Facebook competition for World No Tobacco Day, giving away dozens of exclusive No Smokes t-shirts and baseball caps. Competition details are at:

 Full media release available from Menzies website: 

Lanie Harris

No Smokes team