Tourette's Awareness Month 2022
During Tourette's Awareness month, 15th May to 15th June 2022, our aim was to destigmatise Tourette Syndrome, showing the general public what the reality of TS looks like, dispelling some of the myths that surround it.
What is the issue?
Whilst the majority of people have heard of Tourette Syndrome, many do not really understand what it entails, most thinking that shouting out obscenities is a criteria for diagnosis, when it is not. Tourette's is very often still used as the punchline in jokes and we are not really any further forward than we were 10 years ago.
We believe this is due to the lack of awareness around the condition. It is still one of the least known neurodiverse conditions. The media often portrays TS as the swearing condition and the true realities of what it's like to live with the condition are rarely shown. If we were to educate more, be that in schools, workplaces and general advertising, we would hopefully eradicate a lot of the misconceptions around TS.
How did we aim to help?
During Tourette's Awareness Month, 15th May to 15th June 2022, we ran a campaign that aimed to destigmatise Tourette's with both educating and advertising. The campaign tried to show the general public what the reality of Tourette's looks like, dispelling some of the myths that surround it.
The campaign was called #ThisIsTourettes #ItsNotWhatYouThink. During the month we paid for advertising and displayed our awareness posters on bus stops and within train stations up and down the country. We also asked the TS community to get involved and help us further spread the message by becoming a Tourette's Awareness Partner. We asked them to help us get the message out there further by reaching out to their contacts, in education, health, media and the corporate world.
TA Tourette's Awareness Month Partners
Our partners did a great job!
We had 560 partners join us during the month
We had 117 people take part in #MoveForTourettes
119 people were sent an awareness month pack
311 people displayed our content digitally
4,100 people viewed our awareness video on YouTube
16 buildings and landmarks turned Green for TA
