Background:
A focus area in Denmark is to reduce social inequality in health and it is evident that smoking has a significant negative role. There is a focus on initiatives that reduce barriers for receiving professional cessation counseling and cessation medication.

Aims:
The aim is to increase the number of people, who smoke, participating in professional cessation counseling by increasing referrals, proactive recruitment and awareness of cessation offers and by making cessation medications more available.

Method:
National grants enables Danish municipalities to work targeted with the mentioned aims. A national and local focus on proactive recruitment. The Danish Health Authority has had the effect of the completed grants evaluated.

Results:
The target group were more likely to complete a course compared with other participants. Regarding a grant, targeting socially vulnerable 74 % of the target group were smoke-free by the completion of the course, for participants who did not receive subsidized cessation medicine it was 66 %. After six months, the percentage of smoke-free participants was 48 and 42 % respectively.

Conclusions:
Subsidized cessation medicine has a positive and statistic significant effect on the likelihood of the participant staying smoke-free six months after the cessation course, even when cost is only partially covered. Receiving subsidized cessation medicine can help local cessation services in recruiting, but it can also have a stigmatizing effect if only for i.e. socially vulnerable.