Ethics at Tuck: Prescription Drug Advertising Informative or Manipulative?
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE—February 27, 2004
CONTACT: Kim Keating-603-646-2733
HANOVER, N.H.—During the same week that the Food and Drug Administration released new guidelines for direct-to-consumer drug ads, the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth co-sponsored an ethics panel with Dartmouth Medical School to debate the question: Does prescription drug advertising improve public health or just boost drug industry profits?
The panel, held February 6, addressed the explosion in the practice of marketing prescription drugs directly to consumers. A reported $2.7 billion was spent on such advertising in 2001, more than double the amount spent in 1998. While direct-to-consumer drug advertisements have prompted more discussion between doctors and patients, critics fault the ads for failing to make clear what benefits the advertised drugs offer.
Panelist Jay Davis, former managing director of a division of Medicus Intercon, an international healthcare marketing agency, worked on the first direct-to-consumer advertising campaign-for a nonsedating allergy drug. He said that traditionally, consumers were introduced to new drug therapies via the slow "trickle down" method of diffusion from pharmaceutical company sales person to doctor to patient or via infrequent public relation stories or announcements in the media. The unprecedented first ever direct-to-consumer campaign for this allergy drug included new methods of informing the consumer by using advertisements in consumer magazines, newspapers, radio, and television.
Panelist Kristin Davis, regulatory counsel for the Food and Drug Administration (FDA)'s division of drug marketing, advertising, and communications said that FDA regulations are now requiring clear, truthful drug ads that are both useful and understandable. The FDA is reprimanding drug companies on a number of fronts. Ads should not be self-serving nor should they contain misleading information. The FDA is also insisting that ad messages are consistent with product labels.
Few drug ads use quantitative data to explain how well the product works, noted panelist David Nierenberg, chief of the division of clinical pharmacology and toxicology at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center. He would like to see more product comparisons related to drug efficacy, toxicity, and cost to better inform the consumer.
As director and team leader, global market analytics, at Pfizer Inc., panelist Clifford Thumma's primary responsibility is to improve the impact of the company's direct-to-consumer communication. Thumma noted that motivating consumer behavior is difficult. He said that Pfizer seeks an environment where doctors and patients together make a decision that is right for the patient. Pfizer believes that this will be right for the company as well.
Overall, the panelists agreed that providing consumers more information is a good thing-as long as the information is accurate and honest. The goal of higher advertising standards is to reduce confusion and increase consumer knowledge.
This event was part of the Tuck School's effort to integrate further debate on ethics and corporate responsibility into its curriculum. This was the first in this year's series of business ethics panels organized by Tuck Ethics Professor Rick Shreve, a former managing director at Morgan Stanley, and moderated by Stephen Spielberg, dean of Dartmouth Medical School and former vice president, pediatric drug development, at Johnson & Johnson Pharmaceutical Research and Development.
Previous panels have included "The SUV Debate: Have the car companies traded safety for profits?", "Making Your Numbers: When does managing earnings become cooking the books?", and "Conflict of Interest in the Securities Industry: Can it be fixed?" The Ethics at Tuck series is co-sponsored by Tuck's Dean's Office, James M. Allwin Initiative for Corporate Citizenship, and Ariel Halpern Endowment.
Founded in 1900, Tuck is the first graduate school of management and consistently ranks among the top business schools worldwide. Information about the Tuck School is available at www.tuck.dartmouth.edu.
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