Yes, we are trying something new today. With the enormous interest in DTC ads, in general, and the controversies surrounding the Lipitor and Vytorin advertising, in particular, we thought you would enjoy watching the hearing as it takes place.
Not only that - special just for you - we are including another feature that allows [...]

The new campaign appears to replace the “My Time To Quit” ads that ran after links to suicide were reported earlier this year. A Pfizer spokesman tells us the drugmaker is “exploring” advertising Chantix again in various print and TV outlets after holding talks with the FDA, and claims the ads are being revived because [...]

Want to know the full story behind those famous Bob Jarvik ads for Lipitor? How about the rationale for heavily promoting Vytorin? Then tune in next Thursday May 8 to the House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing on direct-to-consumer advertising. It promises to be a good show.
The subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations is chaired by [...]

The drugmaker is urging Congress to revive a program for those who want to voluntarily submit their television commercials for regulatory review, according to a letter provided to Reuters. Congress created the program last year but it has not taken effect, and lawmakers failed to give the FDA full authority to collect and spend industry [...]

An industry that usually favors Republicans voted in favor of Barack Obama during a mock election held this week at the annual DTC National Conference. The Democratic hopeful won a “primary” vote against Hillary Clinton by a wide margin of 59 percent to 40 percent. And against John McCain, the Republican nominee, Obama garnered a [...]

An Internet video ad for the Pfizer impotence pill was tagged by the FDA for failing to include the necessary info about the risk of heart attacks or vision loss. In an April 16 letter to the drugmaker, the FDA writes the video ad that appeared on CNN.com “raises public health and safety concerns through [...]

Drugmakers are descending on Washington to protect their freedom to advertise meds directly to consumers and push for looser government restrictions on off-label promotion, The Wall Street Journal writes.
Ten drugmakers, including Pfizer, Bayer Corp, AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson have formed a coalition to push for looser off-label restrictions and will submit their arguments today [...]

For all the talk about directing advertising dollars toward the Internet, a few obvious places may have been overlooked. Such as telephone poles. After all, these can be found just about anywhere and it doesn’t cost much to tack up an ad.
As you can see, this one is for the Zyrtec allergy med, which [...]

On January 22, Schering-Plough and Merck announced they would briefly suspend Vytorin ads after the uproar over the disclosure the previous week of the Enhance trial. A spokesman blamed “mischaracterization and misinterpretation” of the study results, which found Vytorin failed to show any benefit over the much cheaper Zocor in reducing plaque in the carotid [...]

The European Commission plans to allow drugmakers to sidestep a ban on DTC by allowing them to provide “information” about their drugs to the public on TV, the internet and in print. And while consumer groups agree that better info is needed, they argue that one-sided information from a drugmaker is little more than advertising, [...]