January 18, 2023 – Most drugs advertised on television are not any simpler than existing alternatives, a brand new evaluation shows. And manufacturers spend more promoting these less effective drugs than those who work higher.
“One possible explanation is that drugs with significant therapeutic value are likely to be recognized and prescribed even without advertising, so manufacturers have a greater incentive to promote drugs with lesser value,” write the authors of the study, which was published last week in JAMA Open Network.
More than 70% of the advertised drugs examined had little profit in comparison with alternatives, while 29% had high profit. Drugs with high profit included a drug for psoriatic arthritis (adalimumab), a drug for heart failure (sacubitril/valsartan), and a drug for lung cancer (pembrolizumab).
The evaluation examined independent assessments of the therapeutic value of 73 of probably the most advertised drugs from 2015 to 2021. The researchers defined therapeutic value as “whether they represent advances over existing treatments.”
Advertising spending for the drugs studied totaled greater than $22 billion over the 6-year period. The researchers found that the common spending during that period for a drug with little profit was $338 million, nearly $73 million greater than for drugs rated as very helpful in comparison with existing options.
“The American Medical Association and public health officials have called for restrictions on direct advertising of drugs, warning that it drives demand for newer, more expensive drugs at the expense of less costly alternatives,” the authors write. “Policymakers and regulators could consider restricting direct advertising of drugs with high therapeutic or health value or requiring standardized disclosure of comparative efficacy and safety data, but policy changes would likely require industry cooperation or face constitutional challenge.”