Warsaw, Poland (June 30, 2025) — “How Sweden Quit Smoking”, a documentary directed by Tomasz Agencki and produced by We Are Innovation, keeps collecting significant achievements. The documentary’s inclusion in the GFN Film Festival 2025 program in Warsaw proved triumphant, securing both the “Best In Fest” and “Audience Choice” awards.
“How Sweden Quit Smoking” tells the story of Sweden’s path towards a smoke-free society, offering interviews with insightful and diverse perspectives from health experts, activists, entrepreneurs, and artists. Since 2008, the country has witnessed an overall 65 percent drop in smoking rates. Today, the smoking prevalence among the entire population is only 5.3 percent, narrowing down to 4.5 percent among individuals who lived under Swedish policies during their whole lives.
The documentary had its avant-premiére in 2023. Throughout 2024, it was screened in private events across three continents, inspiring audiences and sparking policy discussions in Ankara, Brasília, Brussels (European Parliament), London, Madrid, Paris, Prague, San José de Costa Rica, Stockholm, Taipei, Vienna and Warsaw.
In January 2025, “How Sweden Quit Smoking” was made available to the general public via YouTube, Facebook and X. The results were outstanding – the documentary quickly collected an extraordinary amount of 1.5 Million views across platforms. Now, its success has materialized in two trophies.
Federico N. Fernández, We Are Innovation’s CEO, expresses his gratitude for the prize, “These awards validate our belief that innovation in public health communication can drive real change. Sweden’s pro-innovation policies have created a powerful example for the world, and our distribution strategy has already reached more than 1.5 million viewers globally. This recognition affirms that Sweden’s extraordinary public health achievement—reducing smoking by 65 percent—represents the kind of breakthrough thinking other nations urgently need to embrace.”
Tomasz Agencki, the film’s director, feels very proud, “It is a very rare situation when both the jury and the audience share the same opinion. Winning both awards was real-life evidence that our movie can effectively reach very wide demographics. Each time we show this film to a live audience, there are always a number of people telling me how the stories on screen relate to their personal experiences. This humble documentary, with over 1,600,000 views online, could have already influenced hundreds of people to change the way they consume nicotine, thus prolonging their lives. And this is the best award a filmmaker can get.”
Jon Derricot, part-time consultant for KAC and jointly responsible for the GFN Film Festival with Emmanuel Mwape, comments “‘How Sweden Quit Smoking’ is a very important film, clearly documenting the advances Sweden has made in significantly reducing the harms of smoking and giving viewers a clear understanding of why and how that happened. The quality of the production is exceptional and the messages it conveys are essential viewing. For the GFN Film Festival judges there could be only one winner this year and it is significant that the audience agreed with us.”
We Are Innovation hopes that “How Sweden Quit Smoking” continues to raise awareness to public health experts, activists, and policymakers around the world.
ENDS
ABOUT WE ARE INNOVATION
We Are Innovation is a dynamic network of individuals and institutions who deeply believe in innovation’s power to drive progress and solve the world’s most pressing problems. With over 50 think tanks, foundations, and NGOs based worldwide, We Are Innovation represents the diverse voices of a global civil society committed to advancing human creativity, adopting new technologies, and promoting innovative solutions. Through our collaborative approach and cutting-edge expertise, we are driving global transformative change. To learn more about our work, visit us at https://www.weareinnovation.global/.
