WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM MY FRIENDS By Moira Dixson

In the course of our military careers we have our photos taken at many events and in several guises. This picture is one of my favourites. Not that you can tell, but I am the one in the middle.

My last post in the Army was as SO2 Health Promotion at Army Headquarters. I was the Army Medical Services representative in a small team of just 4 personnel.

This photo was taken in the run up to National No Smoking Day which occurs in March every year. There was a close working relationship between the National No Smoking Day organisation, who organised the event, and the Armed Forces Smoking Cessation Co-ordinator due to the high prevalence of smoking within the Armed Forces. A Military No Smoking Day ran along with the national day. Images from military and civilian events were used for publicity for the event. Never wishing to pass up photo opportunities the 3 Services could always be relied upon to come up with some impressive, eye catching and amusing shots. 

The Big Cig character costumes were designed and produced by another smoking action group and proved very popular at events such as Health Fairs to get the No Smoking message across, or at least to start a conversation, the Pudsey Bear of Health Promotion if you like. Our team “lit” on the idea, inspired by the zebra crossing that crossed the main “drag” through the HQ at Wilton, and someone suggested a re-creation of the famous Beatles photo of them crossing Abbey Road but using Big Cig instead of the “Fab Four”. We clearly didn’t do our research very well as we had 5 members instead of 4 and we are crossing in the opposite direction to the Beatles original. However we decided that seeing as we had managed to beg, steal and borrow 5 Big Cig costumes we should use them all to make the biggest impact.

So one sunny morning in March 2009 a Lt Col, 2 Majors and 2 Staff Sergeants donned the Big Cig outfits and waddled our way down to the road to meet the photographer. As we were at Army HQ we were lucky to have access to the services of the Media and Communications professional photographers. The adage that you adapt and do whatever is required to get the job done was certainly at play here. Although our job usually focussed on serious strategic matters, there were times when getting our message circulated called for a more basic and light hearted approach. We didn’t have any other personnel at our disposal so we just got on with it. To be honest, it was great fun and a world away from patient care. On this occasion we were assisted by 2 Royal Army Physical Training Corps Staff Sergeants. The RAPTC had recently taken on an extended role as Health Trainers.

The photo has been a great success, it was circulated throughout Army sources, included in an article in Soldier Magazine and the No Smoking Day organisation used it widely in their publicity that year and also in subsequent years. Military No Smoking Day was an important date for an increased uptake of smoking cessation courses and we hope we played some part in getting the message out that seeking help to stop smoking is significantly more successful than trying to quit alone.



Moira Dixson

Maj (Ret’d)

QARANC