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Diet Coke Helps Fight Heart Disease |
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Tuesday, 04 March 2008 |
Supermodel Heidi Klum will participate in a new, multi-faceted program, designed to raise awareness about women's heart health, that is a product of Diet Coke's recent partnership with the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI) of the National Institutes of Health.
Klum will join the Red Dress Program, which is a part of a national awareness campaign called The Heart Truth created by NHLBI to educate women about the risk factors surrounding heart disease and the need to take action against them.
The Red Dress Program will feature Klum to help raise awareness for The Heart Truth. At the 2008 Academy Awards, Klum will wore an exclusive John Galliano red dress.
The dress also will be featured as a part of The Heart Truth Road Show. In 2008, the show will visit 10 American cities over the course of 10 weeks from February to April. It will be on display at the exhibit, which will also have free heart health screenings and information on heart health.
From Jan. 17 to March 10 customers can enter to win the dress at mycokerewards.com. The winner will be drawn on Mar. 25 and will take home the dress, which has an estimated retail value of $6,000. Diet Coke will donate the money raised from this contest to the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health to benefit women's heart disease research and awareness.
"One in four American women dies of heart disease and most fail to make the connection between risk factors—such as high blood pressure and high cholesterol—and their personal risk of developing heart disease," says NHLBI health communications specialist Allison Fisher in an e-mail.
According to Fisher, almost half of women in 2008 are aware that heart disease is their leading cause of death—up from 34 percent of women in 2000, which is a sign that The Heart Truth is making an impact.
"The Heart Truth is making progress in the fight against heart disease in women. The last six years have seen a steady decline in heart disease deaths in women, a consecutive yearly decline, which has not occurred before," she says.
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