NEJM direct-to-consumer ad study shows drug industry cannot self-regulate

The AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), the USA's largest HIV/AIDS health care provider, has once again denounced direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising by the pharmaceutical industry after an article published in the New England Journal of Medicine revealed not only an astronomical 330% increase in spending on drug ads over the past 10 years (to $29.9 billion), but also the fact that, despite the industry's own recommendation to delay ads for new drugs, the majority of drug company advertising campaigns for the most heavily promoted drugs begin within a year after US Food and Drug Administration approval.

"A Decade of Direct-to-Consumer Advertising of Prescription Drugs," (NEJM, August 16, Julia Donohue, Marisa Cevasco and Meredith Rosenthal) also concludes that, despite the more than tripling of DTC ad spending, regulation of the industry by the FDA has grown weaker, instead of stronger. This, despite the fact that the drug industry and the FDA have come under fire over major mis-steps such as the Vioxx (rofecoxib) debacle and others in which heavily-advertised drugs have turned out to have serious, unknown health risks.

"When it comes to direct-to-consumer advertising of pharmaceuticals, [the] AHF believes that the only ads that are truly useful to consumers without carrying potential for harm are 'help-seeking' ads - those that educate the public about a specific medical condition for which treatment is available, without highlighting a specific drug or brand," said Homayoon Khanlou, the AHF's chief of medicine, USA.