Direct to Consumer Advertising

The average person has no real knowledge of what certain drugs and medicines do to their bodies. The information they have is based on perhaps a bit of past experience using said drug, and what doctors or, unfortunately, ads, tell them. Naturally a company that produces some form of prescription drug, like an antidepressant, is going to try very hard to convince you that first of all, you’re probably are depressed, and second, theirs is the best drug out there to fix it.

The idea of the producers of a drug being able to directly advertise to the drug to the consumer really seems like a bad one to me. As it turns out, most the world agrees. DTCA (direct to consumer advertising) is only legal in 2 countries worldwide: the United States, and New Zealand. These ads are often seen over and over again by the consumer, and are written to be convincing. When a consumer then goes to the doctor convinced they need a particular drug, the doctor may not be able to sway the consumer’s view. The doctor isn’t trained in being persuasive, but he or she is trained in knowing which drugs do what.

A doctor seems like a better source of information as far as which antidepressant or other prescription drug to use, or, perhaps, if one is even needed at all. The problem is so many people are exposed to ads on television or the internet so much more than their exposed to a doctor. Naturally any advertisement for anything is going to be biased toward the item they are advertising, but the sheer exposure to the ads can be enough to convince someone the producer of the ads are right. The doctors, with perhaps decades of studying and experience in the field, end up being less trustable, simply because they aren’t always being heard.

Ultimately, I think DTCA of drug and medicine ads should be illegal in the United States as well. Time tends to reveal that people generally aren’t rational beings, so we shouldn’t be trusted to make the choice when it comes to mind or body altering prescription drugs. Those with the proper education and training and experience are the ones who should be calling those shots.

Source:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2642505/