Big Pharmas - again

I mentioned a while back about two page ads for drugs in my local paper which can read or re-read by clicking here.

One page is all about the drug - usually with a great picture of healthy looking MODELS...the 2nd page - often on the reverse is all about the studies and contraindications - in small print and with no models....it's like reading the teeny tiny print that comes with all medications....

Well today most papers are carrying a story about those TV ads for drugs. Here's the one from the Washington Post.

1.19 BILLION dollars spend on those ads in 2005...can't wait to see what they spent in 2006....and what are they all about? All about healthy looking MODELS who have active lives after taking all those meds....[my choice of words]. I personally love the one where a man and woman are running home to have sex but are instead greeted by friends throwing a surprise party....oops - no problem - my meds allow me to wait for the right time for my ED meds to work....but after I laugh I do listen tot he rapid fire words that the lawyers said need to be there - they are like the teeny tiny print - all the side effects and problems - but unless you have Superman's ability to hear at fast speeds - you can't catch all the words..

According to the report, 95% of the ads use emotional appeal - along the lines of "take me and you will ... " fill in the blank [have a better social life, more sex, nicer cars, anything you want...] - the ads don't say this outright - they infer it - the pharmas hire ad consultants and psychologists - they know they need to appeal to something other than an illness - ill doesn't sell I bet..

So again ... beware of what the pharmas are trying to sell you - they care about one thing - their own bottom line - which is HUGE these days ... but I'll save that one for my lynnsrants blog :- )

Here we go again - again

Another of those "beware what you put in your body " warnings..

Now we learn from a Canadian study that antidepressants double the risk of bone fracture...in whom? people over 50!

I can't find all the statistics but every older person I know was put on an antidepressant for some reason. I'm thinking back to when my own mother broke her hip and in the rehab center the aide kept trying to get her to take her "happy pills." My mom, not being stupid, asked if it was an antidepressant and was told it was..so why call it a happy pill? It was not making my mother happy that they tricked her into it as "one of the meds she was supposed to take."

She refused to take that pill...now I wonder how many older people with broken body parts are regularly given antidepressants? and what is it doing to the healing of the recently broken bones and what future jeopardy are these already vulnerable seniors exposed to?

When will the medical profession, the hospitals, the rehab centers, and nursing homes learn to respect older people and stop medicating them for what seems to be the benefit of the staff - not the patient..

So beware of who is asking yo to take what meds these days...Ask what the long term consequences are and exactly why a certain drug is being prescribed.