By Jackie H
Americans have become used to ads that promote pharmaceutical drugs appearing in everything from magazines to television. However, most countries do not looks so favorably on the advertisement of prescription medications. In fact, direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising is banned in every country except for the US and New Zealand.
Controversy over the ethics behind DTC advertising abounds. On one hand, it can educate the patient, and serve to lessen the stigma associated with some disease, such as erectile dysfunction and depression. However, the commodification of drugs is an issue. Advertising changes the patient from someone with an illness to a consumer, someone who may want to receive the latest and newest (and also the most expensive) “designer” drug on the market. The FDA does very little to regulate this advertising, and no regulation in place has mandatory compliance, beyond an involuntary blurb about side effects at the end of the ad. Some groups call for this DTC advertising to be outright banned, and others believe that it is just another side effect of America’s capitalist economy. However, in order to satisfy the needs of everyone involved, the best method to counter the negatives associated with DTC advertising is to increase mandatory FDA regulation. The issues that must be considered when searching for a solution include the following: what can be more useful for the patient, while allowing pharmaceutical companies to still make a profit? Are physicians being affected by patients who are pressuring them to prescribe certain brands of drugs? What would be the repercussions of banning DTC advertising outright?
Sources: http://www.auburn.edu/~rotfehj/UnhealthyMedMktg.pdf
http://www.fda.gov/Fdac/features/2003/203_dtc.html
