Ads have led John Mack, of the Pharma Marketing Blog, to think that his chances are pretty good that he has ED and Low T. That’s erectile dysfunction and low testosterone for those of you not up on pharma’s alphabet soup of marketing.
Mack writes:
“Symptom quizzes designed by pharmaceutical marketers in cahoots with sponsored patient advocacy groups are dishonest, IMHO. I do not believe they represent “honest dialogues with the public” nor do I believe that they are in “the best interest of patient health,” two principles recently espoused by Bob Perkins, Vice President, Public Policy, AstraZeneca. In fact, they are just the opposite: dishonest and in the best interest of the pharmaceutical company!”
But he also links to a hilarious post on male hormone replacement on the blog, “Is Something Not Quite Right With Stan.” Excerpt:
“Big Pharma wants you to believe their aggressive promotion of ‘T’ disease is growing at epidemic proportions throughout America with millions upon millions of aging men being Low T ripe consumers for their much needed Testosterone-Gel treatment.”
Meantime a story by Reuters Health says that Low T ointment ads have been running during the NBA playoffs. I must have missed those while focusing on double dribbles and three seconds in the paint. But Reuters reports:
“According to a review in the June issue of the Drug and Therapeutics Bulletin, testosterone replacement therapy is questionable because it has risks, its efficacy is uncertain, and there’s no strong agreement about whether low testosterone is really a disease in older age.
…
“We’re skeptical about this,” Dr. Ike Iheanacho, the journal’s editor, told Reuters Health. “You may have men who have symptoms who have low testosterone levels, but in our view it doesn’t add up convincingly to an undoubted medical condition.”
Reuters quotes another doc saying a European doctor “would look at you blankly” if you asked about Low T. Oh, those behind-the-times Europeans! Don’t they wish they could do disease-mongering like we do in the good old USA.
Opinions on other issues in news, journals, PR, advertising, marketing
Progression-free survival: medical jargon that fuels public confusion about cancer treatment & journalism often fails to clarify. @mcjaklevic w/help from @VincentRK @adamcifu @Deadline2020 @DrAttai https://www.healthnewsreview.org/2019/10/how-one-bit-of-medical-jargon-fuels-public-confusion-about-cancer-treatments/
The @nytimeswell effort is shown to be unwell once again.
There's pervasive media bias toward hyping treatment benefits while neglecting negative results & harms.
Big part of this is reliance on experts with financial &/or intellectual conflicts of interest.
Att'n journalists: Use this list 100 independent experts to correct imbalance https://twitter.com/garyschwitzer/status/1177189641218330625
Comments
Please note, comments are no longer published through this website. All previously made comments are still archived and available for viewing through select posts.
Stan
June 9, 2010 at 9:57 pmDear Gary Schwitzer;
I wanted to stop by and thank you for highlighting this serious and growing problem of the pharmaceutical industry propagating rampant disease mongering.
Though, I try often to break the ice with a little satirical humor; we all can only hope our government representatives and regulatory bodies pay heed to this unconscionable, unethical, and dangerous behavior before the only true “epidemic’ we will face in America will be how to support a growing segment of our population that has been either seriously damaged or permanently disabled by prescribed and FDA approved drugs that are absolutely unnecessary in the vast majority of cases. And to think this is being done all in the name of unacceptable sleazy marketing and outrageous greed mongering.
Thanks for stopping by my blog,
Stan
Our Comments Policy
But before leaving a comment, please review these notes about our policy.
You are responsible for any comments you leave on this site.
This site is primarily a forum for discussion about the quality (or lack thereof) in journalism or other media messages (advertising, marketing, public relations, medical journals, etc.) It is not intended to be a forum for definitive discussions about medicine or science.
We will delete comments that include personal attacks, unfounded allegations, unverified claims, product pitches, profanity or any from anyone who does not list a full name and a functioning email address. We will also end any thread of repetitive comments. We don”t give medical advice so we won”t respond to questions asking for it.
We don”t have sufficient staffing to contact each commenter who left such a message. If you have a question about why your comment was edited or removed, you can email us at feedback@healthnewsreview.org.
There has been a recent burst of attention to troubles with many comments left on science and science news/communication websites. Read “Online science comments: trolls, trash and treasure.”
The authors of the Retraction Watch comments policy urge commenters:
We”re also concerned about anonymous comments. We ask that all commenters leave their full name and provide an actual email address in case we feel we need to contact them. We may delete any comment left by someone who does not leave their name and a legitimate email address.
And, as noted, product pitches of any sort – pushing treatments, tests, products, procedures, physicians, medical centers, books, websites – are likely to be deleted. We don”t accept advertising on this site and are not going to give it away free.
The ability to leave comments expires after a certain period of time. So you may find that you’re unable to leave a comment on an article that is more than a few months old.
You might also like