By Rick Stanton
First it was a ban on hard-alcohol ads. Then it was a ban on cigarette ads. And neither made a damn bit of difference in the health and well-being of the common American dope.
Just like we learned in the Prohibition Era, you can’t legislate morality.
I’ve heard rumors over the years that there was an underground tunnel that connected the Sorrento Hotel and Vito’s on East Madison Street on First Hill. This was to insure the bootlegger (a new business category that emerged from Prohibition) had a nice place to stay while the somewhat dubious patrons of Vito’s (think gangsters) had booze to drink while they plotted against Seattle’s Eliot Ness-types.
The fact of the matter is that people will find a way to get what they want, regardless of what the FDA tries to protect us from—even if it kills us. Which leads me to what I’m certain would be a failed effort: Banning big pharmaceutical prescription drug ads from TV and radio.
I’m sure some of you are thinking that Stanton’s really lost his mind this time. Or that Stanton wouldn’t be saying this if he’d had one of those multi-million-dollar accounts to pillage. Regarding the latter concern: We NEVER went after business that could result in good people being hurt or compromised.
That included things like the Washington State Lottery and the casinos. The wrong people are the clients of these kinds of businesses—especially the poor and the elderly. In my opinion, the success of those bettor-based accounts is due mostly to the false promise of “hitting it big.” But back to those big-pharma ads.
Basically, they’re pulling an end run on the traditional doctor’s advice with 60-second TV spots that spend more time telling people why the absurdly named drug can kill them, rather than how it can help them. In no small part, those ads came about because doctors began refusing to talk to drug reps.
So, they found a way to go around doctors and straight to the consumer—even despite having to follow the FDA-imposed requirement of listing all of the scary side effects. And it seems to me that, if you have a medical issue, you should ask your doctor how to handle the problem, rather than tell them.
On top of it all, the ads are both annoying and ubiquitous if you watch or listen to programming directed at anyone over 50. And don’t think for one second that all of this advertising is making prescription drugs cheaper. If anything, it’s exacerbating an already bad situation.
Big pharma companies are simply today’s most immoral business category. They don’t give a rat’s ass about our health. All they care about is making even more gaudy amounts of money.
And consumers need to stop helping them by becoming self-diagnostic idiots.
https://www.fda.gov/drugs/drug-information-consumers/impact-direct-consumer-advertising
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/24/business/media/prescription-drugs-advertising-tv.html