Ottawa – Through the Healthy Canadians and Communities Fund (HCCF), the Public Health Agency of Canada supports projects that address tobacco cessation and prevention, unhealthy eating and physical inactivity. Projects funded through the HCCF help lower the risk of chronic disease, including type 2 diabetes, cancer and cardiovascular disease, with a focus on populations in Canada at the highest risk.
To support projects at various stages, HCCF’s approach to project funding has three phases: design, implement, and scale. As part of the implement phase, the Government of Canada is providing more than $9 million to three Canadian organizations that share a common goal of creating supportive social environments for tobacco prevention and cessation.
The projects receiving funding are:
Lead organization: Canadian Cancer Society
Project name: Connect to Change
Description: This project will contribute to implementing a holistic approach to tobacco cessation, by offering culturally appropriate strategies through a group-based program aimed at fostering social support to decrease commercial tobacco use and increase physical activity. It will be done in collaboration with First Nations, Métis, and urban Indigenous communities in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and British Columbia.
Funding: $2,873,452
Lead organization: Canadian Cancer Society
Project name: BETTER for All
Description: This project will aim to reduce the risk of cancers and chronic diseases in newcomers to Canada and racialized communities through activities that will support tobacco reduction and cessation. Peer health coaches and prevention practitioners with lived experience will be recruited from priority populations and trained to help participants adopt and sustain positive behavior change for tobacco reduction and cessation.
Funding: $3,000,000
Lead organization: McMaster University
Project name: CP@clinic Intervention to Decrease Smoking and Improve Healthy Aging
Description: This project will bring forward tools and activities that will aim to decrease smoking and improve healthy aging. This project will reach approximately 1,750 older adults with low incomes living in Ontario and British Columbia communities. The project will empower groups of residents in social housing by fostering social connectedness, peer support, resource sharing, and participant-led goal setting.
Funding: $679,783
Lead organization: The Governing Council of the University of Toronto
Project name: Expand Project Implementation Phase
Description: This project will design two social marketing campaigns. One campaign will include new innovations to support Two-Spirit people, queer and trans young adults in smoking cessation, by raising awareness on risks of smoking tobacco and vaping e-cigarettes on health. The second campaign will be designed and led by Indigenous partners to have conversations around reclaiming the bond of Semaa (traditional tobacco) as sacred medicine, while highlighting the impacts of commercial tobacco on health and well-being.
Funding: $2,995,645