Celebrity Medications
Do you trust a medication more if a celebrity endorses it through advertising?
Should the celebrity be held accountable for all claims about the drug, even those not made in his ad?
The latest controversy concerns Dr. Robert Jarvik, who designed the Jarvik-7 artificial heart. He stars in print and TV ads for Pfizer’s popular anti-cholesterol drug, Lipitor.
Dr. Jarvik has been subpoenaed in a lawsuit by several labor unions.
They allege that the drug is marketed illegally. Supposedly, their health benefit programs paid for Lipitor for patients who shouldn’t have received it.
The controversy concerns “off-label marketing.”
According to the lawsuit, the FDA approved Lipitor for use with only certain patients, including those whose levels of bad cholesterol, LDL, were 160 ml/dL or higher.
But supposedly Pfizer marketed the drug for use in patients with LDL of 130 or above.
That means more sales for Pfizer and higher expenses for health benefit programs.
I believe the subpoena requires that Dr. Jarvik reveal what Lipitor documents he saw before making the ads, how much money he was paid, and records of his communications with Pfizer and its ad agencies.
I don’t believe that Dr. Jarvik is a defendant in the lawsuit.
There isn’t even an allegation, as far as I know, that his ads mention the off-label marketing of Lipitor.
There’s no doubt that companies like Pfizer use celebrity endorsements to increase the sales of their drugs.
I’ve seen Dr. Jarvik’s ad several times in the last week or so. And I have to admit it made me stop and think — even before I heard of this lawsuit.
I wondered if he really used Lipitor or if he was just a paid spokesman?
I’m not convinced of the benefits of anti-cholesterol drugs. I think there are too many side effects. So I’d try to change my diet first.
But for people who aren’t as skeptical of these drugs as I am, would the presence of Dr. Jarvik spur them to ask their doctors about Lipitor?
I believe it would. But that’s not the issue.
The real question is whether Dr. Jarvik should be held responsible for Pfizer’s claims about Lipitor, especially if those claims weren’t made in his ads?
Maybe the real intent of this subpoena is to scare celebrities away from drug endorsements by appearing to hold them accountable for actions over which they have no control.
If celebrities stop endorsing drugs, sales will go down. And so will the expenses for health benefit programs.
I believe the entire concept of advertising drugs directly to the public is wrong. In my opinion, it drives up the costs of health care by artificially increasing the demand for drugs.
But it’s up to the FDA and the FTC to stop this type of advertising.
I don’t believe it’s fair to hold people like Dr. Jarvik responsible for statements and marketing decisions they didn’t make.
The CEOs of the drug companies should be responsible for that.
Technorati Tags: celebrity endorsements, anti-cholesterol drugs, drug marketing
April 30th, 2007 at 3:46 pm
Stop the endorsements. Drugs shouldn’t be about celebrities.
April 30th, 2007 at 4:10 pm
It doesn’t sound fair to go after Dr. Jarvik. But maybe we don’t have all the facts. It’s tough to tell.
April 30th, 2007 at 4:31 pm
I don’t really like the idea of celebrities endorsing drugs, but I’ve known people who had to find their own medical information to get help. Sometimes, doctors don’t help you either because they don’t have time or they don’t have the knowledge. It depends what’s wrong. If you have a problem and no one’s helping you, you’ll probably want the knowledge and then you can discuss it with your doctor. It would be a mistake to go back to the days when we relied only on our family doctor for medical information.
April 30th, 2007 at 6:44 pm
In a way, I guess I do trust a drug more if a renowned doctor like Jarvik makes an ad for the drug company. Intellectually, I know I shouldn’t but I do anyway.
April 30th, 2007 at 7:11 pm
It’s not fair to go after the guy if he didn’t make the statements in his ad.
April 30th, 2007 at 7:31 pm
If the drug companies market to doctors instead of consumers, they wouldn’t have this problem, would they? We all pay for the cost of those primetime advertisements in high drug costs and bigger insurance premiums.
April 30th, 2007 at 8:55 pm
There was somehting about that commercial that bothered me. I didn’t like to see a doctor hawking a drug. I certainly feel that lifestyle changes are always the best idea before any drug therapy. As for marketing, drug companies market to everyone!! Don’t lose site of the unfortunate fact that most people are unwilling to make the changes that are necessary to treat disease states and they seek the poorer choice of a drug.
April 30th, 2007 at 11:41 pm
I thought Lipitor was a prescription drug. Unless someone can get it over the counter, how could an ad make people buy more without their doctor’s consent? A patient could ask for the drug, sure, but they can’t get it unless the doctor says okay and the doctor makes the decision about the LDL cholesterol level.
May 1st, 2007 at 7:35 am
Drugs and medicine have become too much of a big business. It’s not about helping patients these days, it’s always about profits, profits, profits. This kind of advertising is getting out of hand and the government should do something to stop it. Is Jarvik responsible for too many people buying Lipitor? If too many people really did take this drug when they shouldn’t have, the drug company and the doctors who prescribe Lipitor should be looked into, not the guy starring in the commercial. If he hadn’t done it, someone else would have, although it would’ve been nice if he hadn’t tried to make a profit too.