Belgium has a good social healthcare system. But not everyone has access to it. It’s a harsh reality most Belgians never get confronted with. We needed to generate a public debate and introduce Doctors of the World, an unknown organization in Belgium with no advertising budget.

That’s why the campaign should have a strong PR appeal, to grab the mass media and the public attention for free. The insight is powerful because it’s based on a truth: people only notice society’s problems when those stories are brought by the media. To change that, we asked famous Belgian director Jan Verheyen to help us.

We conducted a social experiment. A pregnant woman sat down in front of a train station. For 8 hours not one person stopped to help her. Then a 30-men large film crew surrounded her and suddenly she got the attention from everyone passing by. Proving the point that reality only gets our attention when it is brought to us by the media.

A film of the experiment was sent to all mass media and bloggers (national and international) and Jan Verheyen became a spokesman for DotW. During the following days every newspaper and radio station brought the story and opened the debate, creating a 400,000 euros integrated campaign for free. The amount of Facebook fans of DotW tripled. The film was in the top three of mostly viewed films posted on the website of the public broadcast (deredactie.be) in 2014.

First we conducted a social experiment.

A pregnant woman sat down in front of a big train station. For 8 hours long not one person stopped to help her. Then a 30-men large film crew –including a famous Belgian director– surrounded her and suddenly she got the attention from everyone passing by. Proving the point that reality only hits us in the face when it’s presented as fiction.

Then a press release with a video of the experiment was sent to all major radio and tv stations, newspapers, etc. The video was also posted on DOTW’s Facebook page.

In the next few days Jan Verheyen became a spokesperson together with the people of DOTW. They were invited asked for interviews and debates in all sorts of media.Today the film is still being aired used at two universities to open class debates about social empathy and the right to free health care.

A film of the experiment was sent to all mass media and Jan Verheyen, the director, became a spokesman for Doctors of the world. During the following days every newspaper and radio station brought the story. Listeners, readers and experts on the subject were involved in the debates, creating a 792 500 euros integrated campaign for free. The amount of Facebook fans of DOTW tripled.

And today the film is being used at two universities to open class debates about social empathy and the right to free health care.