Warning: Drug Ads Can Make You Sick
By Terry J. Allen, In These Times. Posted January 3, 2008.
The drug industry spends billion on advertising that tells us health and happiness are commodities, and anything less is a disease.
Jane's family is suffering from plagues of biblical-lite proportions. Her teenage son is unruly and easily distracted. Her daughter has menstrual cramps, is 12 pounds overweight and shy. Her husband sleeps fitfully and has occasional heartburn and irregularity -- not to mention that his libido is falling and his cholesterol rising. As for Jane, her menopause generates more heat than a blowtorch. Her knees twinge, her breasts are less perky and her jaw line more blurred. Her personality is flat and her legs restless. All of them are less happy than they think they should be.
Although there is a diagnosis, pill or surgical treatment for each of their ills, the family members could simply be suffering from exposure to advertising that sells a fantasy of flawless health, perfect skin, clockwork bowels, extended youth and perpetual cheerfulness in the face of disappointment, aging, money woes and the reign of George Bush. They may, in fact, be healthy people snookered by the pharmaceutical industry, the media and their doctors into believing that ordinary frailties are diseases; that the human condition can be cured.
A $4.2 billion annual industry incessantly reinforces this medicalization of complaints through direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising.
In 1998, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) decided to allow pharmaceutical companies to hawk prescription drugs to the public, with limited oversight and minimal explanation of safety and side effects. A 2006 Government Accountability Office investigation found some of these marketing efforts "false and misleading" and faulted the FDA -- which is responsible for oversight -- for failing to maintain standards of accuracy and to protect the public. The United States and New Zealand are the only countries that allow DTC marketing.
Big Pharma says that the goal of DTC ads is to educate the public about what treatments are available. But there is no denying that the images of people caressed by soporific green moths, charmed by Latino bees and enticed by sexually fulfilled couples can create expectations and perceived needs that lead to unnecessary and expensive drug consumption. Some of the products are only minimally effective. Many can cause liver or kidney damage, high blood pressure or other adverse effects that would have to be countered with still more drugs -- each with its own side effects and risky interactions.
One undeniable side effect of DTCs is increased sales and profits for drug manufacturers. "Every $1 the pharmaceutical industry spent on DTC advertising in 2000 yielded an additional $4.20 in drug sales," the Kaiser Family Foundation recently reported. Indeed, direct-to-consumer advertising "was responsible for 12 percent of the increase in prescription drugs sales, or an additional $2.6 billion."
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http://alternet.org/story/72357/
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