TV ads for psych meds

[starlitegirlx]

I remember the first time I saw a commercial for a psych drug. Despite being on psych meds, I thought that advertising them like groceries was inherently wrong. The hypocrisy of drugs you need a prescription to get being allowed while alcohol and cigarettes weren't seemed disturbing. Worse was that now people would hear the magical things these drugs could do and go running to their doctors to get them when in reality you're supposed to go to the doctor when you don't feel well, not because a pill advertised on TV sounded like it could magically heal all your woes. Note, I wrote woes, not ails because it's no longer about what ails you. It's about what woes you have, and who in life does not have them?

 

There really should be some kind of legislation against medications being advertised on TV. The fact that I know the name of so many drugs that I've never taken and I no longer work in the medical profession is disturbing. But I guess that's how it is when medicine becomes all about money and big pharma making their billions.

 

Ever notice how the list of side effects sounds like it's being read by an auctioneer? And they always leave it till the last possible second. And that sometimes you don't even understand half of what is said by the auctioneer? Reminds me of witchdoctors and side show carnivals.

[Altostrata]

You said it, starlite!

[Barbarannamated]

Pharma adverts are the biggest contributor to TV budgets, magazines, as well as the most powerful lobby in government. I can't imagine they will be legislated away.

 

Agree with all you said, Starlitegirl.

[starlitegirlx]

Pharma adverts are the biggest contributor to TV budgets, magazines, as well as the most powerful lobby in government. I can't imagine they will be legislated away.

 

Agree with all you said, Starlitegirl.

 

And so the indoctrination continues. So we've moved off the physical lobotomies and onto the chemical lobotomies. Guess that's what's considered progress nowadays. Booya!

[jr1985]

I remember thinking this was so weird when I was in the US. We don't have drug ads in the UK, so it was really bizarre to see them advertise Abilify, an antipsychotic!

[starlitegirlx]

I remember thinking this was so weird when I was in the US. We don't have drug ads in the UK, so it was really bizarre to see them advertise Abilify, an antipsychotic!

 

I really want to move to the UK all of a sudden.

[ellenr]

Only 2 countries in the world allow advertising of pharmaceutical drugs - the US and New Zealand.

In the US, direct-to-consumer advertising was illegal until 1985.

 

And it is very effective! Study after study finds that people see these ads, go to their doctor, and demand the drug. Many doctors will admit they give the person the drugs, even if they don't think they are appropriate, so as not to lose them as a patient.

 

Many people put more more care into choosing a car than in choosing a medicine. I can't imagine selecting a Chrysler for example, bec. I see an ad for it. Instead I do some research. Sadly many people don't, even when it concerns what they put into their bodies.

[starlitegirlx]

I think because they put too much faith in medicine and big pharma and the FDA. They think that if it is on the market, it is safe and it will fix them. They don't have that same caution with consumer products because they know they can get lemons end up screwed in the deal. What they don't understand is how corrupt the FDA and big pharma are. They don't realize that often some of the most dangerous side effects are swept under the carpet. They don't understand that long term effects are never accounted for because even though getting FDA approval takes a long time, you could take a drug and have effects from it past the time that it was monitored. Long term effects for drugs that you'll be taking for a long period of time, especially drugs you may one day want to come off of are what people need to be particularly cautious of but are not.

 

We've been trained for quick fixes and that life should be good. When it is not, we don't accept that life is not always good or fair. We instead look for a way to make it feel better rather than coping with what is and adapting to how things are. I blame the media. It really is their fault. Before TV commercials and magazines and the rest of it, people just lived their lives and functioned as best as they could and made the best of it. Reality shows have made it even worse. Now we've got epidemics of bulimia, anorexia, overeating, overspending to have some glimmer of the lives we see or are promised. People stay in miserable jobs and careers to keep these things and waste their lives for material possessions that mean nothing and add nothing to their existence while being miserable most every day. In short, society is F****d.

[strawberry17]

Being in the UK like JR I was so shocked when I found out these drugs are advertised on TV in other countries, something so fundamentally wrong about it.

[Altostrata]

Now they're advertising prescription roll-on testosterone on US TV. Now, who would be interested in that?

 

And then they punish athletes for steroid use????

[alexjuice]

People are being misled. This situation here, people are being told what they want to hear that "their pain can be prescribed away". If we gave the people a vote on the matter of legality of psych drugs, the people would overwhelmingly support them. The people want these drugs. The corporations want to sell them.

 

There are too many dishonesties to keep track of, really. But across the board we live in an age well represented by child-like resistance to reality. (maybe all ages are like this, I've only lived in this one.)

 

In the end, these things self-correct -- it's like tossing an apple into the air. Once I've tossed it, the shelf-life for the argument that the apple can float forever is rather limited.

 

Sometimes there is some benefit to understanding physical laws like gravity. Mostly though there is not. Gravity is not good or bad, just is.

[alexjuice]

Being in the UK like JR I was so shocked when I found out these drugs are advertised on TV in other countries, something so fundamentally wrong about it.

 

I can understand your surprise. I don't think the situation is particularly rosy in with pharmaceutical distribution in Britain though. I used to think it was somewhat better there and in Canada and the anglo-far west (or what's the shorthand for AUS+NZ?) but I've come to reason that each is likely worse in certain regards, better in others. This may be one area that where the UK and the other nations that disallow the ads come out ahead.

[compsports]

I remember thinking this was so weird when I was in the US. We don't have drug ads in the UK, so it was really bizarre to see them advertise Abilify, an antipsychotic!

 

Even so called alternative health magazines like Prevention advertise drugs like Abilify. I was so shocked to see an advertisement for it that I wrote the powers to be and said they were a bunch of hypocrites for doing this. I never received a response.

 

CS