Japanese health ministry aligns with McCann Healthcare for national campaign

The appointment follows a protracted 60-agency pitch and displaces incumbent Dentsu, which is understood to have handled the MHLW’s national health campaign duties for the past decade.

The MHLW is preparing to launch the second phase of its national health campaign – ‘Kenko Nippon 21’ – next month. Kenko means ‘health’ in Japanese; the campaign is set to run until 2012.

Amar Urhekar (pictured), McCann Healthcare’s executive vice-president for Japan and Asia-Pacific, described the account as “very prestigious”. He explained that the campaign’s long-term objective would be to “promote health awareness and raise the health level of the Japanese people”. But he noted that the MHLW was looking for a “different approach” to achieve that goal.

Urhekar said that while the campaign’s first phase had attempted to address nine areas under the umbrella of ‘public health’, McCann Healthcare would simplify the agenda by focusing on just three for the next stage: diet and nutrition, exercise and smoking cessation. The initiative’s core strategy would be modelled around evidence-based behavioural science, he said.

He added that in its proposal to the MHLW, the agency had emphasised the importance of tracking and periodical evaluation of the campaign’s progress. He noted that the task would be made easier by the narrowed focus.

The scale of the account is not known at this stage. Urhekar said that with state funds limited, the Government would look to develop commercial partnerships as a way of facilitating the campaign. “It’s still work in progress,” he stated, adding that as an “ambitious target”, initial work would be rolled out in the first quarter of next year.

Earlier this year, the MHLW appointed McCann Healthcare to help improve the diagnosis and treatment of schizophrenia in Japan.

In Korea, the agency was recently tasked with developing a campaign to raise awareness of the threat of tuberculosis.