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Debi Austin, star of jarring 1990s anti-smoking ad, dies at 62
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Matthew Kruk
Feb 27, 2013, 6:34:41 PM2/27/13
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http://www.latimes.com/health/la-me-debi-austin-20130301,0,4565474.story
Debi Austin, star of jarring 1990s anti-smoking ad, dies at 62
After losing her larynx to cancer, Debi Austin became a powerful advocate in the
public-awareness campaign against smoking. In a memorable ad, the Canoga Park
woman puffed on a cigarette through a surgical hole cut in her throat.
By Ari Bloomekatz, Los Angeles Times
March 1, 2013
Debi Austin looked into the camera, swallowed - the hole in her throat as big as
a half-dollar coin and as black as nothingness - and said she had her first
cigarette when she was 13, that she had tried to quit but couldn't. And that
"they" say nicotine is not addictive.
Then she picked up a half-burned, still-lit cigarette from an ashtray, titled
back her head and took a drag from the hole in her neck. She winced, and as the
smoke wafted out of the hole she said: "How can they say that?"
The public-awareness television ad, which began airing in the mid-1990s, turned
the Canoga Park woman into a powerful symbol of the anti-smoking movement.
Austin, who became an anti-smoking advocate and educator, died Friday at Valley
Presbyterian Hospital in Van Nuys after a 20-year battle with cancer, her family
said. She was 62.
Diagnosed with cancer of the larynx she had a laryngectomy, which removed the
tumor and her vocal chords. She learned to talk using esophageal speech, or
"burp talk."
She agreed to make the startling "Voicebox" ad only after a 4-year-old niece
drew a black dot on her own neck to mimic her aunt's scar from the surgery and
said: "I want to be like you."
State Department of Health officials called Austin California's best known
anti-tobacco advocate and said her "Voicebox" ad is "the most-recognized and
talked about California tobacco control ad," according to a statement released
after her death.
"Debi was a pioneer in the fight against tobacco and showed tremendous courage
by sharing her story to educate Californians on the dangers of smoking," the
agency's Dr. Ron Chapman said in a statement.
In recent years Austin often traveled around the state to spread her
anti-smoking message to young people. She also made two more anti-smoking ads
that began airing in 2011.
People remembered her, Austin said, because she was scary. She hoped that they
would see her and think twice about lighting up, according to a 2010 Times
interview.
"I am the worst-case scenario that your mother told you about," Austin had said.
"I am the walking dead, the cast-off of the tobacco industry that they can't
fix, they can't heal."
Deborah Austin was born April 13, 1950, in Illinois and moved to Los Angeles the
year she turned 4.
While walking home from junior high in Canoga Park she took her first puff on a
cigarette, an unfiltered Camel that she had filched from her father.
By high school, she was smoking a pack of unfiltered Camels a day. The habit
only increased in adulthood when she attended UC Berkeley and managed a small
private telephone company.
In the early 1980s she sought treatment for a chronic sore throat and by 1992
noticed a small lump under her jaw. A biopsy confirmed cancer of the larynx.
Before surgery, she joined a support group for people who had undergone removal
of their larynx.
"I'd never met or heard anyone who'd had a laryngectomy," she told The Times in
1997. "I thought, 'Omigod, I make my living on the telephone and now I'm going
to sound like Elmer Fudd on Thorazine for the rest of my life.'"
She would only say that she was "well compensated" for the ad that turned her
into a "tobacco educator." Austin stopped smoking about eight months after it
first aired.
Austin's survivors include her sisters, Jamie Marshall of Portland and Deena
White of Canoga Park; and her brother, Jim Gardner of Camp Verde, Ariz.
Times Staff Writer Valerie J. Nelson contributed to this report.
ari.blo...@latimes.com
Copyright � 2013, Los Angeles Times
Debi Austin, star of jarring 1990s anti-smoking ad, dies at 62
After losing her larynx to cancer, Debi Austin became a powerful advocate in the
public-awareness campaign against smoking. In a memorable ad, the Canoga Park
woman puffed on a cigarette through a surgical hole cut in her throat.
By Ari Bloomekatz, Los Angeles Times
March 1, 2013
Debi Austin looked into the camera, swallowed - the hole in her throat as big as
a half-dollar coin and as black as nothingness - and said she had her first
cigarette when she was 13, that she had tried to quit but couldn't. And that
"they" say nicotine is not addictive.
Then she picked up a half-burned, still-lit cigarette from an ashtray, titled
back her head and took a drag from the hole in her neck. She winced, and as the
smoke wafted out of the hole she said: "How can they say that?"
The public-awareness television ad, which began airing in the mid-1990s, turned
the Canoga Park woman into a powerful symbol of the anti-smoking movement.
Austin, who became an anti-smoking advocate and educator, died Friday at Valley
Presbyterian Hospital in Van Nuys after a 20-year battle with cancer, her family
said. She was 62.
Diagnosed with cancer of the larynx she had a laryngectomy, which removed the
tumor and her vocal chords. She learned to talk using esophageal speech, or
"burp talk."
She agreed to make the startling "Voicebox" ad only after a 4-year-old niece
drew a black dot on her own neck to mimic her aunt's scar from the surgery and
said: "I want to be like you."
State Department of Health officials called Austin California's best known
anti-tobacco advocate and said her "Voicebox" ad is "the most-recognized and
talked about California tobacco control ad," according to a statement released
after her death.
"Debi was a pioneer in the fight against tobacco and showed tremendous courage
by sharing her story to educate Californians on the dangers of smoking," the
agency's Dr. Ron Chapman said in a statement.
In recent years Austin often traveled around the state to spread her
anti-smoking message to young people. She also made two more anti-smoking ads
that began airing in 2011.
People remembered her, Austin said, because she was scary. She hoped that they
would see her and think twice about lighting up, according to a 2010 Times
interview.
"I am the worst-case scenario that your mother told you about," Austin had said.
"I am the walking dead, the cast-off of the tobacco industry that they can't
fix, they can't heal."
Deborah Austin was born April 13, 1950, in Illinois and moved to Los Angeles the
year she turned 4.
While walking home from junior high in Canoga Park she took her first puff on a
cigarette, an unfiltered Camel that she had filched from her father.
By high school, she was smoking a pack of unfiltered Camels a day. The habit
only increased in adulthood when she attended UC Berkeley and managed a small
private telephone company.
In the early 1980s she sought treatment for a chronic sore throat and by 1992
noticed a small lump under her jaw. A biopsy confirmed cancer of the larynx.
Before surgery, she joined a support group for people who had undergone removal
of their larynx.
"I'd never met or heard anyone who'd had a laryngectomy," she told The Times in
1997. "I thought, 'Omigod, I make my living on the telephone and now I'm going
to sound like Elmer Fudd on Thorazine for the rest of my life.'"
She would only say that she was "well compensated" for the ad that turned her
into a "tobacco educator." Austin stopped smoking about eight months after it
first aired.
Austin's survivors include her sisters, Jamie Marshall of Portland and Deena
White of Canoga Park; and her brother, Jim Gardner of Camp Verde, Ariz.
Times Staff Writer Valerie J. Nelson contributed to this report.
ari.blo...@latimes.com
Copyright � 2013, Los Angeles Times
Brad Ferguson
Feb 27, 2013, 10:29:32 PM2/27/13
to
In article <eKwXs.512526$%p1.3...@en-nntp-02.dc1.easynews.com>,
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAaGbsHBacE>
Matthew Kruk <nob...@home.com> wrote:
> http://www.latimes.com/health/la-me-debi-austin-20130301,0,4565474.story
>
> Debi Austin, star of jarring 1990s anti-smoking ad, dies at 62
> After losing her larynx to cancer, Debi Austin became a powerful
> advocate in the public-awareness campaign against smoking. In a
> memorable ad, the Canoga Park woman puffed on a cigarette through a
> surgical hole cut in her throat.
> By Ari Bloomekatz, Los Angeles Times
> March 1, 2013
>
> Debi Austin looked into the camera, swallowed - the hole in her
> throat as big as a half-dollar coin and as black as nothingness - and
> said she had her first cigarette when she was 13, that she had tried
> to quit but couldn't. And that "they" say nicotine is not addictive.
>
> Then she picked up a half-burned, still-lit cigarette from an
> ashtray, titled back her head and took a drag from the hole in her
> neck. She winced, and as the smoke wafted out of the hole she said:
> "How can they say that?"
>
> The public-awareness television ad, which began airing in the
> mid-1990s, turned the Canoga Park woman into a powerful symbol of the
> anti-smoking movement.
The ad dates from 1996, and it's as gruesome as the writer implies:
> http://www.latimes.com/health/la-me-debi-austin-20130301,0,4565474.story
>
> Debi Austin, star of jarring 1990s anti-smoking ad, dies at 62
> After losing her larynx to cancer, Debi Austin became a powerful
> advocate in the public-awareness campaign against smoking. In a
> memorable ad, the Canoga Park woman puffed on a cigarette through a
> surgical hole cut in her throat.
> By Ari Bloomekatz, Los Angeles Times
> March 1, 2013
>
> Debi Austin looked into the camera, swallowed - the hole in her
> throat as big as a half-dollar coin and as black as nothingness - and
> said she had her first cigarette when she was 13, that she had tried
> to quit but couldn't. And that "they" say nicotine is not addictive.
>
> Then she picked up a half-burned, still-lit cigarette from an
> ashtray, titled back her head and took a drag from the hole in her
> neck. She winced, and as the smoke wafted out of the hole she said:
> "How can they say that?"
>
> The public-awareness television ad, which began airing in the
> mid-1990s, turned the Canoga Park woman into a powerful symbol of the
> anti-smoking movement.
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAaGbsHBacE>
Sarah Ehrett's Lesbian Love Interest
Feb 28, 2013, 3:06:34 PM2/28/13
to
On Feb 27, 7:29 pm, Brad Ferguson <thirt...@frXOXed.net> wrote:
> In article <eKwXs.512526$%p1.340...@en-nntp-02.dc1.easynews.com>,
Tame.
When I smoked and worked in a hospital, I would go outside to the
smoking area on my break. Often there would be a person who would be
puffing through their trach hole. They should have shown a person who
had their jaw and tongue removed, slobbering into a towel while they
had a ciggy. Or maybe they could have shown a mental patient giving a
blow job for a contraband cigarette. I had one patient who'd smoke
through his trach, and because of cancer he couldn't swallow, so he
would chew food that he loved and then instead of swallowing, he'd
spit it out in a can; he'd eat an entire meal that way.
> In article <eKwXs.512526$%p1.340...@en-nntp-02.dc1.easynews.com>,
When I smoked and worked in a hospital, I would go outside to the
smoking area on my break. Often there would be a person who would be
puffing through their trach hole. They should have shown a person who
had their jaw and tongue removed, slobbering into a towel while they
had a ciggy. Or maybe they could have shown a mental patient giving a
blow job for a contraband cigarette. I had one patient who'd smoke
through his trach, and because of cancer he couldn't swallow, so he
would chew food that he loved and then instead of swallowing, he'd
spit it out in a can; he'd eat an entire meal that way.
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