Grey, saggy skin, wrinkles and jowls: The stop-smoking app that shows exactly what the habit will do to your face
- App shows smokers just how much they will ravage their looks
- Ages the face by up to 20 years to display effects of chemicals in cigarettes
- Has been designed to encourage younger people to quit before it’s too late
- 40 per cent of regular smokers took up the habit before they were 16
PUBLISHED:16:46 GMT, 19 March 2013| UPDATED:19:08 GMT, 19 March 2013
A new smartphone app has been created to show smokers just how much they will ravage their looks if they continue to light up.
The app ages the face by up to 20 years to display the damaging effects of the 4,000 chemicals found in each cigarette.
Produced by the NHS, the Smoking Time Machine, as it is known, is it has been designed to encourage younger people to quit before it’s too late.
Premature ageing: The app ages the face by up to 20 years to display the damaging effects of the 4,000 chemicals found in each cigarette
It is designed to highlight the effects of smoking, such as such as deeper wrinkles around the eyes and mouth, sagging jowls and a grey paleness to the skin. Above is 10 years of damage, according to the app
Kate Norman, from Cumbria Partnership NHS Trust, which has launched the app as part of its month-long stop smoking campaign, said: ‘Young people – and teenagers especially – don’t necessarily think the obvious consequences of smoking such as cancer and lung disease is going to happen to them.
‘But this app uses their face and shows them how they will look. It’s something that is very close to home and hard to ignore.’
The app user takes a photograph of their face and they are then aged by more than a decade into what they could look like as a smoker.
The result is a drastic picture of the effects the habit has, such as deeper wrinkles around the eyes and mouth, sagging jowls and a grey paleness to the skin.
The app designers also mocked-up how Kate Moss might look due to smoking
This photograph can then be saved and shared, as a constant reminder of what smoking is doing to a person’s appearance.
Cumbria Partnership NHS Trust worked with forensic profilers to generate a lifelike representation of the effects of smoking.
Research done by the team showed that 40 per cent of regular smokers took up the habit before they were 16.
Therefore, it is hoped that teenagers’ vanity will be an incentive to stop smoking early or preferably never take it up in the first place.
It is hoped that teenagers’ vanity will be an incentive for them to to stop smoking early – or avoid the habit in the first place
Forensic artist Auriole Prince from digital marketing company “Change my Face’ said: ‘This is the first time Smoking Time Machine has been used in a public health campaign and we think the app works brilliantly as a shock tactic to show people what will happen to their appearance if they carry on smoking.’
The app also details information on how to kick the habit through Cumbria’s Stop Smoking Service.
The campaign literature details how many of the chemicals in cigarettes are found in dangerous substances such as embalming fluid, jet fuel, bleach, and rat poison.
The Stop Smoking Service is encouraging smokers to think about the chemicals they are inhaling every time they light up. Many of them are known to cause cancer.
The app is available from today and can be downloaded from the iTunes store or Android Play store.
For more information: http://www.cumbriapartnership.nhs.uk/rollercoaster-smoking-time-machine-app.htm
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2295751/Grey-saggy-skin-wrinkles-jowls-The-stop-smoking-time-machine-app-shows-exactly-habit-face.html#ixzz2O22lyUuI
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