TV Ads for Meds May Make Us Sick

um yeah i would have to agree with this. i mean people do understand that this is happening right? its pretty basic stuff. maybe people outside of ats doesnt.....

We've recently reported on subliminal ads on TV, but the constant barrage of advertisements for new medicines are anything but subtle! Do the prescription drug ads we see on TV make us think we're sick when we're not? These ads are part of the new "empowered patient" movement, which means that doctors have lost some of their professional clout when it comes to making diagnoses and prescribing treatment—is this good or bad?

Psychiatrist Jonathan Metzl thinks that these ads amplify people's cultural expectations, or even change them—for instance, erectile dysfunction drug ads that are featured prominently at sporting events as well as on TV play to men's perceptions of what it is to be a normal, healthy man. The same goes for antidepressant ads showing women who are able to fulfill their roles and duties as mothers only when they are taking pills.

Studies have shown that patients who go to their doctors and ask for a medicine they saw in an advertisement are likely to get it—which is part of the reason the blitz of ads has escalated every year since the US Food & Drug Administration relaxed the rules for them in 1997. The fact that physicians themselves are exposed to the same ads means that they may be influenced too.


If you want to stay healthy, get plenty of blue apples!

www.unknowncountry.com...

ALL adverts make me sick.

All the pretty graphics, and the cute cartoon characters.
I swear that one of the Ads for an antihistimine, uses Antonia Bandaras voice as a bee that flits around the screen.

I'm sure that the drugs companies are just doing it as a public service, right? LOL

you know, inform the public on whats available, so you aren't at the mercy of whatever the Doc is pushing that week. Yeah, right.

[edit on 21-3-2007 by spacedoubt]

Yes, I think we all suffer from seasonsl allergies, erectile dysfunction, restless leg syndrome, acid reflux disease, osteoporosis, bladder control problems, high cholesterol, insomnia, etc., etc., etc. now.

Money........

It's so easy to spot the motivation of drug companies advertising meds that you have to go to the doctor to get, just look at or listen to the "possible side effects" disclosed in each commercial.

Political payoffs secured this, I guess the old school penis-pump companies couldn't afford the bill........forgive my french

Don't be fooled by these ads, I equate them to the old stagecoach Tonic MD's who went town to town to hustle their goods....

These are the same people who want to tell you that your kid is hyperactive and needs ritalin.....schools condone this for a more "peaceful" student body.....

When I went to school, fear of the principal's paddle kept the students focused.......

Excellent post. I've been bothered recently by never ending radio ads for IGRT "image guided radiation therapy" I can give you the name because I hear it in my sleep because I hear it every 5 minutes on the radio.

Here's my angle...Why the hell would a hospital advertise a "technology/procedure/whatever" to potential cancer patients? If I'm sick and go to my doctor, I expect him or her to figure out whats wrong with me, and order the appropriate tests. Who goes to the hospital and says..." I'll take an MRI, two CT scans and an IGRT...to go."?

The agenda of the FDA and Big Pharma is to sell more drugs, make more money, keep people sick so they have to buy more drugs.


Pharmaceutical television advertising is a grand hoax

The advertising practices of drug companies are so outrageous that even David Kessler, the former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, penned an editorial condemning them. In fact, Kessler says television ads never should have been allowed by the FDA in the first place (the FDA legalized drug ads in late 1997, after Kessler left his position there). Today, the United States is the only industrialized nation in the world to allow drug ads on television.

Some additional articles:

The great direct-to-consumer prescription drug advertising con: how patients and doctors alike are easily influenced to demand dangerous drugs


Pharmaceutical fraud: How Big Pharma's marketing and profits come before consumer safety and wellness



It's no surprise that these ads are allowed to be shown. Television puts the viewer into an alpha state, allowing subliminal messages into the mind very easily.

Here is a brief history of the number of people hospitalized for mental illness since the early 1900's.

By 1903, 1 out of every 500 people in the United States is hospitalized for mental illness.

By 1955, roughly one out of every 300 people was disabled by mental illness.

From 1955 to 1987, roughly one out of every 75 persons are deemed disabled mentally ill.

Now it’s one in every 50 Americans disabled by mental illness.

The number of mentally disabled people in the United States has been increasing at the rate of 150,000 people per year since 1987. That's an increase every day over the last 17 years of 410 people per day newly disabled by mental illness.

Combined spending on antipsychotic drugs and antidepressants jumped from around $500 million in 1986 to nearly $20 billion in 2004. So we raise the question: Is the use of these drugs somehow actually fueling this increase in the number of the disabled mentally ill?

Source: Psychiatric Drugs: Chemical Warfare on Humans - interview with Robert Whitaker

i guess the average joe has no idea that this is going on? surely he does. i cant imagine a person not knowing that his mind is being manipulated by these advertisments. well, yeah i can. sometimes i will ask a simple question about things like this where i work and sadly its like im speaking in a different language. deer in the headlight look. im afraid that there is no stopping this part of the beast. too big.

Originally posted by Funkydung
sometimes i will ask a simple question about things like this where i work and sadly its like im speaking in a different language. deer in the headlight look. im afraid that there is no stopping this part of the beast. too big.

Yes I get that too. And I work with VERY intelligient people. When I tell them about this stuff, they just laugh and say... yeah it's a "conspiracy".

I figure if they want to be the sheeple herded into oblivion, the hell with 'em. I choose to pay attention to what's going on around me.

This is really an important subject. Most of the older people I know (and I mean over 40) are on three or four meds for various ailments. And the older people are on 10 or 12.

I'm totally sick of the pharmaceutical industry. It is huge and (I'm sure) in bed with the government, as annestacey says. (great sources!)

For this reason alone, getting more members on ATS is a Good Thing.

And for a little satirical comic relief:




FLAG this thread!

[edit on 24-3-2007 by Benevolent Heretic]

Originally posted by annestacey

Originally posted by Funkydung
sometimes i will ask a simple question about things like this where i work and sadly its like im speaking in a different language. deer in the headlight look. im afraid that there is no stopping this part of the beast. too big.

Yes I get that too. And I work with VERY intelligient people. When I tell them about this stuff, they just laugh and say... yeah it's a "conspiracy".

I figure if they want to be the sheeple herded into oblivion, the hell with 'em. I choose to pay attention to what's going on around me.

yeah the people i work with are also very intelligent and some of them know that something is going on thats shady. but when i try and let them in on it and actually show them how the pharm companies are turning people into zombies they laugh. everything is a conspiracy to me they say. yeah im to the point where im done with people who will not choose to educate themselves past their own interests. some just absolutly dont care. things like this are so important to us and mainly our children. i will never understand other than they are prime examples of brainwashing.

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
This is really an important subject. Most of the older people I know (and I mean over 40) are on three or four meds for various ailments. And the older people are on 10 or 12.

I'm totally sick of the pharmaceutical industry. It is huge and (I'm sure) in bed with the government, as annestacey says. (great sources!)

For this reason alone, getting more members on ATS is a Good Thing.

And for a little satirical comic relief:

FLAG this thread!

[edit on 24-3-2007 by Benevolent Heretic]

im with ya bh. i know older folks that load themselves up on pills daily. this has totally changed their personality and outlook on life. im sick of the industry too. im certain that they are in with the government. all part of the nwo no doubt. peoples whos brains are mush are easy to manipulate. like i said before the industry and the nwo is already to big. its here. i have a 10 year old son who is my best buddie and ill be damned if he will go thru life totally ignorant of whats going on. little by little i let him know about the commercials and the manipulations that are happening via the media. thats about 10 percent of the time...90 percent is all fun riding 4 wheelers and basketball....letting him have a great childhood. there will be time for the fight when he gets older.

Okay - dont WANT to be sexist, also don't wan't to derail the topic at all

Just wanted o point out that in my experiance I have noticed that blokes have a much lower tolerance for adverts than women. That is to say women are much more likely to sorta go into that old alpha wave state at ad breaks - as opposed to us blokes who would rather flick channels / do something else till the prog is back. This has been the cause of many arguments, is this universal, or just this neck of the woods?