Mr K N Desiraju, Secretary, Health & Family Welfare, Government of India along with WHO Representative to India, Dr Nata Menabde launched on 11 July 2013, a unique health awareness initiative – Donate Your Caller Tune For a Cause.
Also present at the launch was Mr Anshu Prakash, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, Government of India.
‘Donate Your Caller Tune’ is an initiative for which prominent celebrities have lent their voices to create simple and effective health messages. It is a first-of-its kind initiative based on the use of mobile phone caller tunes to promote health awareness on several issues. A symbolic ‘donation’ is made when people give up their regular caller tunes, replacing them with a health awareness message or subscribe to ‘Donate Your Caller Tune’. The donation, therefore, is not asking a user for funds, but simply that s/he changes/donates a caller tune with a health related message.
Speaking at the launch, Mr K N Desiraju, Secretary, Ministry of Health & Family Welfare said, “We are facing a growing burden of noncommunicable diseases, a large proportion of which are preventable to a large extent through modifying behavioural risk factors like unhealthy diet, lack of physical activity, consumption of tobacco products and alcohol etc. It is important that we explore innovative mediums such as caller tunes to create awareness of such issues.”
Explaining the rationale of the ‘Donate Your Caller Tune For a Cause’ WHO Representative to India, Dr Nata Menabde, said, “The idea is to reach out with creative messages for adopting healthy lifestyles. According to industry estimates, on an average, a person receives around 15 phone calls a day, making the space of caller tune an untapped area for promoting health causes.”
One can download the message of a favourite celebrity and use it as a caller tune on one’s own mobile handset. Instead of a conventional dial tone or popular music track, a person who calls hears a prominent celebrity’s voice exhorting him or her to make one small lifestyle change to live a healthy and happy life.
The health awareness caller tune messages are available on the website (www.donateyourcallertune.in). One can download, after choosing a cause and a celebrity and then enter one’s mobile number and submit. Alternatively, the tune can also be obtained by using one’s mobile handset to scan specially designed QR codes embedded in celebrity images.
The celebrities and the causes they have supported are: Amitabh Bachchan (High Blood Pressure), Jaya Bachchan (Breast and Cervical Cancer), Akshay Kumar (Unhealthy Food), Ranveer Singh (Fitness), R Madhavan (Diabetes), John Abraham (Obesity), Shankar Mahadevan (Stroke), Shaan (Anti-tobacco), Cyrus Broacha (Stress) and Parineeti Chopra (Cardiovascular Disease). Other celebrities will be joining the campaign in the next phase of the initiative.