More than one person commits suicide in Singapore every day. But the truth is, the first step to preventing suicide is to simply talk about it. However, most people in Asia shun away from the topic, and even if they didn’t, they don’t know how to broach the subject.

We wanted to turn every Singaporean into the first line of defence against suicide, by looking out for their friends and family members.

And to top it off, we only had a tiny budget of S$10,000.

Just as you’d ask someone wearing a plaster if he or she was all right, preventing suicide starts by asking, “How are you?” The plaster was the perfect solution to help open conversations among Singaporeans, and get them to talk about a subject that’s normally taboo.

With that in mind, we distributed 50,000 plasters on World Suicide Prevention Day at popular locations such as shopping malls, subway stations, etc. The plaster (through #howru) also helped spread the message further, and got more people talking about suicide on social media – thus amplifying our message and reach.

We also created a digital plaster that people can add to their social media profiles, and put together a YouTube video for people to share online.