What Are the Public Health Effects of Direct-to-Consumer Drug Advertising?

Elizabeth A Almasi, Randall S Stafford, Richard L Kravitz and Peter R Mansfield

PLOS Medicine, 2006, vol. 3, issue 3, 1-

Abstract: : Only two industrialized countries, the United States and New Zealand, allow direct-to-consumer advertising (DTCA) of prescription medicines, although New Zealand is planning a ban [1]. The challenge for these governments is ensuring that DTCA is more beneficial than harmful. Proponents of DTCA argue that it helps to inform the public about available treatments and stimulates appropriate use of drugs for high-priority illnesses (such as statin use in people with ischemic heart disease). Critics argue that the information in the adverts is often biased and misleading, and that DTCA raises prescribing costs without net evidence of health benefits. Proponents of such advertising say that it informs the public and stimulates appropriate use of drugs, but critics argue that the adverts are misleading and raise prescribing costs without net evidence of health benefits.

Date: 2006
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:plo:pmed00:0030145

DOI: 10.1371/journal.pmed.0030145

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