Stop the Sores
Los Angeles County syphilis social marketing campaign for men who have sex with men, launched in 2002 as early syphilis cases climbed from 126 in 2000 to 809 in 2005. It used a branded cartoon character and audience research to push syphilis testing.
- Years
- 2002–now
- Country
- United States
- Topic
- HIV/STI
- Asks people to
- Start
- Strategy
- HumorSimple instruction
- Channel
- OutdoorPrint
- Audience
- AdultsMenMen who have sex with men in Los Angeles County.
Evidence
ObservationalPositive
2004 cross-sectional evaluation (Plant 2010): men aware of the campaign were nearly twice as likely to have been tested for syphilis in the past 6 months and knew more about syphilis than unaware men.
Sponsor (who paid)
- Los Angeles County Department of Public Health State local government, funder and creator
Credits (who made it)
Not recorded yet.
Related campaigns
- Healthy Penis 2002–now
- Check Yourself 2007–now
Sources
- Plant A et al. Stop the sores: the making and evaluation of a successful social marketing campaign. Health Promot Pract 2010;11(1):23-33 evaluation · 2010 · DOI 10.1177/1524839907309376 · PMID 18403747
- Nanin JE et al. Community reactions to a syphilis prevention campaign for gay and bisexual men in Los Angeles County. J Sex Res 2009;46(6):525-34 evaluation · 2009 · DOI 10.1080/00224490902829590 · PMID 19291502
Research notes
Created 2026-10-22 by literature mining (PubMed/OpenAlex); evidence level, outcome and findings are paraphrased from the evaluation abstracts, full texts not read. No credits: no page naming an agency was checked. US-CA (Los Angeles County). Followed by Check Yourself (2007).
Record cases/la-county-stop-the-sores.json, updated 2026-10-22· Link to this campaign