Anatomy of a statin ad

I posted last year about all the trouble Pfizer got into by using Robert Jarvik, the developer of the artificial heart, as their spokesman for the most commonly prescribed statin drug Lipitor.  Pfizer has taken a new tack and is now bombarding the airwaves with yet another commercial for Lipitor using as their spokesman an…

A bad week for statins

A bad week for statins

Despite the fact that statin drugs are the best-selling medications in history, accounting for some $40 billion plus in sales world wide last year, they had a very bad week this past week. And it looks like their scrutiny is going to pick up a little. The Vytorin trial that finally came to light late…

Drug ads on TV

All I can say is thank God I morphed out of my regular medical practice and into nutritional medicine before the legalization of drug advertising on television. I watch very little TV – mainly NFL games, and usually only those I have a bet on – but even with the minimal amount I do watch…

Beauty and the bowel

While we’re on the subject of television ads I’ve got to pass one along that’s one of the most pernicious I’ve seen in a long time. This one, sent to me by a reader, has to take the cake for being subtle, yet misleading and dangerous. Television and print advertisers have long feed on the…

A blast from the past

Unbelievable as it seems, this was a television commercial that ran in the early 1950s. We’ve come a long way, baby. [youtube id=”gCMzjJjuxQI”] For those who didn’t grow up with it or those who did and just don’t remember, it’s hard to imagine how pervasive cigarette ads were in the 1950s, 60s, 70s, and 80s….