They bombard your TV day after day: ads for drugs to treat arthritis, diabetes, depression and countless other maladies, hour after hour, around the clock.
There’s the green luna moth flying around the bedroom, promoting Lunesta for insomnia.
There’s the elephant sitting on a man’s chest, touting Spiriva for chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder.
There’s the his-and-her bathtubs on the beach, offering help to men who have problems cuddling.
If you think you’re seeing more of them every year, you’re right. Last year, drugmakers spent $4.5 billion on such advertising, a 30 percent jump from 2012, according to Kantar Media, a market research firm that specializes in media consumption.
These ads pitch directly to consumers, urging them to talk to their doctors with the aim of getting prescriptions.
Drugmakers say direct-to-consumer advertising encourages people to seek medical advice and removes the stigma associated with dealing with medical conditions. The ads can trigger “important doctor-patient conversations about health that might otherwise not take place,” says a white paper issued by the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers America, a trade association based in Washington.
But critics say drugmakers use the ads to push expensive treatments.
“It seems like they are everywhere. You can’t get away from them,” said Diana Zuckerman, an epidemiologist and president of the National Center for Health Research in Washington, D.C., a nonpartisan research organization. Her group opposes the ads, saying medical decisions should be made by doctors, not uninformed consumers prodded by drugmakers.
Some also question the accuracy of such ads. Two years ago, researchers at Dartmouth College and the University of Wisconsin-Madison found that nearly 60 percent of prescription drug ads were misleading or false. They reviewed more than 150 that aired between 2008 and 2010 during national news broadcasts on ABC, CBS, NBC and CNN.
For example, an analgesic combined with a sedating antihistamine was marketed as helping people “feel better.” The researchers said that while there was evidence that the combination drug reduced pain, there was no evidence that such pain relief “resulted in better sleep, mood or overall functioning.”
The ads often confuse and mislead consumers, researchers wrote in the September 2013 issue of the Journal of General Internal Medicine. “These results are in conflict with proponents who argue the social value of drug advertising is found in informing consumers about drugs,” they wrote.
Public Citizen, a national consumer group, says such advertising pressures doctors to prescribe particular medications — often drugs that may be less effective and more expensive and risky. Plus it can waste a doctor’s time, the group said.
“It takes up valuable time to explain to patients why they may have been misled by the drug advertisements they have seen,” the group said in a white paper.
Some observers say the rise in direct-to-consumer advertising has contributed to the higher cost of health care. Spending on prescription medicines jumped 13 percent last year to $374 billion, according to data firm IMS Health, although some of it was for new drugs, like a breakthrough treatment for hepatitis C.
“I would say direct-to-consumer advertising definitely has contributed to high drug prices,” said Brad Wright, assistant professor of health management and policy at the University of Iowa’s Public Policy Center.
The United States and New Zealand are the only two countries that allow direct-to-consumer drug advertising.
In 2007, the World Health Organization made a unanimous recommendation against direct-to-consumer advertising, saying it carries “a significant risk of exposing more patients to the adverse effects of new drugs” and distorts public health priorities.
The ads have been around for decades but haven’t always been straightforward. In 1997, Schering-Plough aired a commercial showing people walking through a meadow. “At last, a clear day is here,” the announcer said.
The ad, for allergy drug Claritin, never mentioned what the medication was for but urged people to “see your doctor.” Sales of Claritin surged from $900 million in 1996 to $2.1 billion in 1998, setting off the modern direct-to-consumer movement.
Over the years, the industry has assailed the airwaves, magazines and newspapers with ads for drugs to treat everything from furrowed brow to overactive bladder. Many of the ads became the targets of late-night humor. Comedian Chris Rock once deadpanned: “I saw a commercial the other day that said, ‘Do you go to bed at night and wake up in the morning?'”
Some drug executives have expressed regret at the heavy push into consumer advertising.
“Direct-to-consumer promotion was the single worst decision for the industry,” William Burns, head of pharmaceuticals for Swiss giant Roche, said at a news conference in 2008. He said it has led to industry image problems and has cast doubt on drugmakers’ claims that they spend mostly to research and develop new lifesaving medicines.
According to Nielsen, drugmakers spent nearly $20 billion over the past five years to advertise drugs to consumers. Spending has gone up over the past three years, after holding steady or declining in the previous two years.
The biggest share of the ad money last year was spent on television ($3.2 billion), followed by magazines ($1.2 billion), newspapers ($127 million), radio ($26 million) and billboards ($4 million).
An entire cottage industry has sprung up around direct-to-consumer drug advertising. Dozens of ad agencies specialize in promoting drugs, taking in tens of millions of dollars in billings. There are annual awards ceremonies for best direct-to-consumer advertising, with Best Branded Print, Best Branded Website, Best Branded Digital, and so on, broken down by disease.
Agencies and drug companies are awarded gold, silver and bronze at the DTC National Conference in Washington. Among the Illinois medalists were drugmakers Astellas of Northbrook (gold in Best Branded Digital for overactive bladder medicine Myrbetriq) and AbbVie of North Chicago (silver in Best Branded Website for psoriasis medicine Humira).
The ads appear everywhere: during cop shows, golf tournaments, comedy reruns and the evening news. They mostly feature actors who talk about their problems with itchy skin or diabetes, and how they have trouble coping with everyday tasks.
Of the top 10 advertised drugs, two are for erectile dysfunction (Cialis and Viagra), three are for arthritis (Xeljanz, Humira and Celebrex), two are for mental health issues (Latuda and Abilify), and one each is for stroke prevention (Eliquis), fibromyalgia (Lyrica) and diabetes (also Lyrica).
Often the language is stiff and scripted. “If you have moderate to several rheumatoid arthritis like me, and you’re talking to your rheumatologist about trying or adding a biologic, this is Humira adalimumab,” begins one of the many TV spots for Humira, the drug made by AbbVie.
Humira is approved to treat eight conditions, including arthritis, Crohn’s disease and severe chronic plaque psoriasis. Last year, AbbVie spent $363 million on direct-to-consumer advertising, trailing only industry leader Pfizer, which spent a whopping $1.1 billion. Of AbbVie’s spending, $203 million went toward advertising Humira for arthritis and psoriasis, according to Nielsen.
“AbbVie believes in the value of direct-to-consumer advertising to educate patients and encourage a dialogue with the physician,” the company said in a statement.
Many drug commercials are easy to mock. During the Super Bowl, drugmaker Valeant advertised a treatment for toenail fungus called Jublia. It featured a talking toenail with a football helmet, demonstrating how the medicine attacks fungus. The Washington Post rated it one of the five worst commercials of the game.
“Seeing this anthropomorphic, festering toenail did NOT make any of us feel good about eating tortilla chips last night,” the reviewer wrote.
Twitter @johnrussell99
