On (Sun  8 De) Rich Woods wrote to Dennis Mummert...
 RW> One point I have never seen brought up is  the EXTENSIVE advertising
 RW> (Parade Magazine, TV advertisng etc) on drugs prescribed by a
 RW> physician.
 RW> Ask your physician about xxx drugs etc - nice ads with clouds and
 RW> ballons and happy smiling people (shades of Soylent Green). Why should
 RW> drug companies advertise drugs to the consumer? Shouldn't  the
 RW> physician determine what a patient might or might not need?
 RW> This to me is promtoing drug use......
Abso-fucking-lutely!  These kinds of ads are a relatively recent phenomenon.
Previously, you'd only see them in medical journals such as JAMA, Lancet
and NEJM and all the specialty journals.  Apparently, however, some
pharmaceutical companies found that there were no more restrictions on where
they could advertise their prescription drugs than where they could promote
their over-the-counter products.  The first time an ad for Cardizem was
placed in TV Guide (with the additional text "Ask you Doctor About Cardizem")
the sales skyrocketed, as patients nagged their cardiologists about this
new wonder drug.  It had, in fact, been on the market for a very long time,
and many physicians were prescribing the generic form (diltiazem HCL) which
was available from many manufacturers at much lower costs.  But once a
brand name was given such a high profile push, patients asked for it
by name, and didn't want a generic equivalent.
Now, we're even seeing TV commercials in primetime for these prescription
drugs!  My god, they're pushing these dangerous drugs as if they were
no more harmful than Budweiser, Coors or Miller High Life!  Perhaps we
should alert the Partnership for a Drug-Free America that the companies
who provide their funding are themselves drug pushers!  How could they
have been so blind?
... We have quite enough youth...how about a fountain of smart?
--- PPoint 2.00
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