The World Heart Federation and Healthy Stadia have recently worked together to implement tobacco control and smoking cessation interventions at the 2016 Homeless World Cup.
Studies have revealed that while smoking prevalence amongst homeless populations can be over 70%, the desire to stop smoking is the same as non-homeless populations*.
With this in mind, Healthy Stadia delivered a smoking cessation brief intervention training workshop to managers and coaches from national teams participating in Glasgow, with the intention of upskilling coaches to support players who are smokers to engage with national stop smoking services in their home countries.
The intervention also used Healthy Stadia’s six-step approach guide to motivating smokers to reflect upon the benefits of quitting and using a stop smoking service to help achieve their goal, which can be employed by homeless team coaches in their dual role as football trainers and mentors.
With positive feedback from coaches in attendance, plans are already underway for a multi-risk brief intervention training programme for coaches at the 2017 Homeless World Cup in Oslo, to incorporate the topics of alcohol, tobacco, recreational drugs and sexual health.
