Drug ads on TV - beware of overmedicating yourself!

Pharma TV advertising has exploded over the past decade, and a recent study at UCLA indicates that the advertising has little educational value and may influence people to overmedicate themselves.

Medical News Today reports that:

The findings also show that nearly all ads (95 per cent) used emotional appeal to influence viewers and none of them showed lifestyle and behaviour change as viable alternatives, except for 19 per cent of them that showed this as an adjunct to taking the drug.

Dr Frosch, author of the UCLA study, said:

"We're seeing a dramatization of health problems that many people used to manage without prescription drugs," ... "ads send the message that you need drugs to manage these problems and that without medication your life will be less enjoyable, more painful and maybe even out of control." Frosche said the US should consider banning direct to consumer tv advertising of prescription drugs. Only the US and New Zealand currently allow these ads and New Zealand may ban them soon.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/61985.php