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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Health tips for caller tunes

Health tips for caller tunes

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published Published on Jul 12, 2013   modified Modified on Jul 12, 2013
-The Telegraph


New Delhi: The World Health Organisation wants India's public to give up Bollywood songs as caller tunes on their mobile phones and replace them with short health messages from superstars of India's entertainment industry.

The global health agency today launched what is being dubbed as the world's first attempt to promote health campaigns via caller tunes, drawing on the voices of 10 personalities from Bollywood and other entertainment sectors.

Amitabh Bachchan's deep baritone will caution callers about high blood pressure, television comedian Cyrus Broacha will urge people to find ways to reduce stress, and playback singer Shaan will sing a short anti-tobacco jingle.

Industry executives estimate that about 40 million mobile phone users across India are active with caller tunes, also called ring-back tones - using anything from Bollywood songs to jokes to movie dialogues. The executives say mobile phone users on average receive between five and 15 calls a day.

"We thought we should use this (caller tunes) medium for something that will be very useful to the public," Nata Menabde, WHO's representative in India said at the launch. "This has never been done before," she said.

Minutes after the launch, university students armed with posters and face-masks of the 10 celebrities fanned out across a large mall in the capital urging members of the public to pick one of the new caller tunes. Mobile phone users may select the caller tune of their choice from the website www.donateyourcallertune.in and download it. Callers to such mobile phones would hear a health message instead of standard ring tones or other caller tunes.

The messages contained in the caller tunes are intended to get people to alter behaviour and lifestyle and reduce the risk of several non-communicable diseases such as diabetes, heart disease, stroke or cancer. Public health experts estimate that non-communicable diseases account for nearly 53 per cent of deaths in the country.

"What callers will hear are not boring prescriptive messages," said Seema Sood, director with Leo Burnett, the advertising agency whose teams in Mumbai and New Delhi conceptualised the campaign. "There'll be elements of entertainment in each caller tune," she told The Telegraph.

Five mobile phone service providers (Aircel, Airtel, BSNL, Tata Docomo, and Uninor) have already agreed to make available these caller tunes to their customers, while a sixth service provider (Vodafone) is expected to join the club soon, a senior WHO official said.

"I think this is a good initiative," said K. Srinath Reddy, a senior cardiologist and president of the Public Health Foundation of India, an academic institution in New Delhi.

"Members of our public have a fascination for celebrities and are fond of caller tunes, but this should be followed up with some evaluation to see how it influences beliefs and behaviour," Reddy told The Telegraph.

The WHO is hoping the caller tune campaign will expand over time and complement the government's national programme for the prevention and control of cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases and stroke launched in 2010.

The national control programme currently implemented in 100 districts in 21 states seeks to screen patients attending government clinics and use public health messages to sensitise people about ways to reduce the risk of non-communicable diseases.

"Celebrities have proven to be good ambassadors for various causes - their involvement adds a lot of value to this campaign," Menabde said.

Sood said the campaign launched today is a pilot phase programme and is expected to be expanded through more messages from other celebrities in future.

While India has nearly 900 million registered mobile phone users - some with multiple numbers - the ring-back tones penetration is estimated to be 40 million.

"The ring-back tones penetration is relatively high in India as compared to most of western nations," said Vijay Pratap Sai, director with OnMobile Global, a technology company that handles ring-back tones services for several mobile phone network providers in India. "This makes ring-back tones an appropriate technology for mass dissemination of messages."


The Telegraph, 12 July, 2013, http://www.telegraphindia.com/1130712/jsp/nation/story_17109007.jsp#.Ud_H26zcjco


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