2/16/2026 at 9:28:46 PM
by shpat
2/16/2026 at 9:44:37 PM
Drug companies were held in much higher esteem when direct advertising was illegal. Direct advertising also encourages patients to request specific branded drugs, which may not be appropriate for their conditions; and it massively inflates drug costs, as the US pharmaceutical industry now spends more on marketing than on R&D.Basically the answer is no & the experiment has been a disaster.
by A_D_E_P_T
2/17/2026 at 1:37:07 AM
For fun, when a drug ad comes on I often search <drug name> + “price”. A thousand dollars a month? No wonder you can afford all these ads.by kwertyoowiyop
2/16/2026 at 10:56:18 PM
On one hand:If it's not legal for me to buy something then why do I see ads for it? Prescription drugs and products for children like toy and food ads during kid's shows fall in this category.
On the other hand:
- Not everyone has a doctor that gives them more than 3-4 minutes during a visit. So, while this is a separate issue that drug ads aren't designed to solve, there are positive effects:
-- Drug ads may make you aware of a treatment you didn't know about before.
-- Drug ads are a good opportunity for companies to inform of the side effects of drugs.
And:
- The "placebo effect" may contribute to a success of a drug. Maybe drug ads help start this psychological process through the visuals in their ads.
Regarding the content of most pharmaceutical ads, I'd say they don't really explicitly mislead and they do their best to present side effects and such in the timeframe of the commercial. I haven't seen any that are more annoying or untruthful than other typical ads.
I associate negative thoughts with them not because of the content or purpose of the ads, but because the ads seem to appear where older people are believed to be, and that means someone has put you into an old-person bucket.
by RiverCrochet
2/16/2026 at 10:05:24 PM
No.by simulator5g
2/17/2026 at 1:50:53 AM
Betteridge's law. Ethics and morality are secondary to predatory money, money, money extraction from docile and under-protected American consumers subsidizing the rest of the world.by burnt-resistor
2/16/2026 at 11:23:34 PM
Disappointing article. On one hand, we have direct costs and over prescription. On the other hand, we have folks being educated that (a) they have a condition they should speak to their doctor about or (b) a condition they knew they had had a new treatment option. To answer the headline question you need to at least attempt to measure each of those.by JumpCrisscross