BRIEF: Getting a lifesaving treatment to the people who need it most.

There’s an opioid overdose epidemic in the UK. Thousands die every year, and the number is

only going up. What’s worse? Those deaths are preventable. Ethypharm’s drug, naloxone, can reverse an opioid overdose. As part of UK law, it’s free and legal to carry by almost anyone.

But take-home naloxone coverage in the UK is just 16%.

Ethypharm came to us with their marketing objective of raising awareness about seriousness of opioid overdose, and increasing uptake of naloxone, so this life-saving treatment could get into the right hands.

We spoke to the only people our audience trusted: other people who use drugs. We travelled across the UK to interview the few people who had used heroin and carried naloxone, and their stories became the campaign.

We used candid, street-style photography to capture images that felt organic and natural. We chose black and white to give them grit – the light and darkness emphasising life and death. The art direction is crafted to give it a reportage feel, with fonts reminiscent of newspaper headlines. After all, these were stories that had to be told.

We crafted a series of advertisements designed to stop our audience in their tracks. They would see that this wasn’t some authority figure telling them what to do. This was a message from their own community encouraging them to act.

Ethypharm had considered multiple places to intervene: emergency services, charities supporting homeless communities, lobbying authorities, and the government.

Ethypharm knew their product had the potential to save lives, but healthcare and welfare systems can’t always respond immediately. During an overdose, a few minutes can make all the difference. Our insight had to uncover the most effective way to get naloxone used in time at the point of crisis.

We uncovered a startling truth: the best people to stop an opioid overdose aren’t police or paramedics.

It’s the people most likely to witness an overdose. People who use drugs.

Our research showed there was a tribal sentiment within the community – the feeling of ‘us against the world’. The strategy was to tap into this mentality, and encourage them to stop their mates from dying. It was about the community looking after itself, rather than being told what to do.

Knowing that our audience would be out on the streets daily, both to pick up opioids and to use them, we decided that street posters would be the most effective way of reaching our audience.

We targeted cities and specific locations across the UK where drug-related deaths are high. This importantly included Glasgow and Dundee, which have the highest proportion of drug-related deaths across the UK. We also focused on smaller coastal towns where heroin use is prevalent, like Redcar and Blackpool.

The campaign ran as two waves in 2021, first in April, then in August and September, timed alongside International Overdose Awareness Day on August 31st.

Ethypharm’s brief was to raise awareness of the seriousness of opioid overdose and show that they are preventable – and that’s exactly what the campaign achieved. Demand for naloxone significantly increased from the campaign’s launch to the end of the year:

- 33% increase in demand for naloxone vs. previous year

- 6,331 additional kits on the street as a result of the campaign

- An estimated 1 in 4 people who use opioids now carry naloxone

Every naloxone kit distributed into the community is another potential life saved. And with a budget of £150,700, each potential life saved cost just £23.80.