QUIT4October is a pilot initiative aimed to help people quit smoking with the help of their local GP or pharmacist.

Dubbo GP Jane Weyand said there were 6,500 people in the Dubbo area that still smoked.

She said the first step to quitting was having a yarn with a medical professional.

"People think 'oh, no it's hard', everyone's got their own excuse but doing it together it's much more likely to succeed," Dr Weyand.

Lung Foundation Australia CEO Heather Allan said about 40 per cent of people tried to quit the habit every year.

However, while only two to three per cent of smokers who try to do it on their own are successful, the figure increases ten-fold for those who get assistance from a doctor or pharmacist.

Dubbo mayor Mathew Dickerson said the amount of Australians who smoked had decreased from about 70 per cent during World War Two to 17 per cent now, but it was still too high.

Cr Dickerson said the cost of smoking was huge, not only based on the money spent buying cigarettes, but the added healthcare expenditure.

Lung Foundation Australia calculates around $6500 would be saved per year by someone who quits smoking a pack a day.

Dubbo City Council's director community services David Dwyer said cigarette butts were also one of the most littered items in Dubbo.

Australia-wide 7.2 billion butts are estimated to be littered each year.

As part of QUIT4October, a stall will be set up at the Live Healthy and Live Well Expo on October 18.

The stall will include smokerlyser tests to analyse the amount of carbon dioxide in someone's lungs, as well as information on the program.

The School of Rural Health has also thrown their support behind the campaign, encouraging people to use QUIT4October as motivation to stop smoking.

More information about the program, which is launching in Dubbo, Ryde, Ballarat and Toowoomba, can be found at www.quit4october.com.au.