Birthday Cake PSA

The birthday cake PSA was a public service announcement aired in the United States in the late 1990s and early 2000s. The PSA warned about the dangers of respiratory illness, and focused on a child being unable to blow out the candles on their birthday cake because of their condition. Despite several online accounts of the PSA, it remains lost, and the organization that created it is unknown.

Plot

The commercial features an unseen boy attempting to blow out candles on a birthday cake. Some sources claim that the birthday cake had dinosaur decorations on it. The boy cannot stop coughing and is unable to blow out the candles. One user believes the PSA was about pneumonia, but others are unsure. It may have been about asthma, whooping cough, or secondhand smoke. The goal of the commercial was likely to convince parents to vaccinate their children and prevent such conditions.

Airings

All witnesses agree that the commercial aired sometime from the late '90s into the 2000s. One user even said the commercial may have aired into the early 2010s. It has been suggested that the PSA aired for a somewhat long time.

As for networks on which the PSA aired, a majority of the sightings come from Cartoon Network. Other children's channels Nickelodeon and Boomerang were also believed to have aired the spot. One user recalls seeing the commercial late at night in between paid programs on HGTV.

The Search

The earliest known post about the PSA was made to r/pifsandpsas on May 2, 2021 by u/Paintguin. The same user made a second post about the PSA to the same subreddit on February 5, 2022. A post to r/tipofmytongue by u/zephyrmckey was made on April 17 of that year, followed by another post to r/pifsandpsas by u/Paintguin on September 27. The Lost Commercials Foundation created a channel for the search on their Discord server on September 28.

On March 31, 2025, blameitonjorge uploaded a video covering the search. Several viewers of the video, including zephyrmckey, commented that they also recalled seeing the commercial, mainly on Cartoon Network.

Please be advised that the below commercial is NOT the birthday cake PSA, though it is very similar:

Resources and Links

* A document compiling all known sightings of the commercial
* A map of all known sightings with locations:

How Can I Help?

* Watching Nickelodeon/Cartoon Network commercial breaks from the timeframe on YouTube
* Finding blank VHS tapes from the timeframe
* Researching potential organizations behind the PSA

LCF-TV wants to hear from viewers like you!

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— Lost Commercials Foundation (@lostcommercialsfoundation.org) August 25, 2025 at 8:16 PM