Advertising works wonders in the US, so now big pharma is pushing to have an advertising ban on medicines lifed in the European Union, five years after a previous effort failed.

With the backing of industry-funded patient groups and a few vocal parliament ministers, The Guardian writes that drugmakers have succeeded in persuading the European commission that the rules need reform, and it is now discussing how this could be done.

However, it is the trade arm of the commission - not the health arm - that is involved in the discussion and looking at ways to allow companies access to patients. It has set up a forum to come up with proposals, chaired by commissioners Gunter Verheugen and Markos Kyprianou.

Interestingly, nobody uses the word “advertising”. All the talk is of allowing pharmaceutical companies to give information direct to patients.

Critics complain of a lack of transparency and that the membership of the working group on information to patients has not been made public. Only two patient groups have been included; one of them receives substantial funding from the pharmaceutical industry

A coalition of critics, the Medicines in Europe Forum, which includes consumer groups, the International Society of Drug Bulletins (which assess meds independently) and health insurers, wrote to the commissioners last week. They deplored the fact “that since its inception the pharmaceutical forum has operated with an almost total lack of transparency” and warned that it was not in drug companies’ interests to provide full and unbiased information to patients

Drugmakers are a legitimate source of info about their products and consumers are capable of recognising promotional advertising, whether meds or washing powder, says Rodney Elgie, president of the Global Alliance of Mental Illness Advocacy Networks in Europe, which receives backing from several drugmakers, including Lilly and Pfizer.

Further reading….
The Guardian[tags]Advertising, DTC[/tags]