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In Remembrance
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Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: about 45 minutes to anywhere!
Posts: 3,086
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In Remembrance
Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: about 45 minutes to anywhere!
Posts: 3,086
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does pharma market disease as well as drugs?
Do Pharmaceutical Companies Market Diseases as well as Drugs?
These days - if you watch TV - television drug commercials are so ubiquitous that it's hard to remember a time when they didn't exist. But direct-to-consumer advertising, as it is called, has only been around in the US for 10 years, and it's illegal in many other countries. Despite having been around for such a short time, some doctors and scientists believe that direct advertising has already changed the way drug companies do business in the US, allowing them to not only market drugs but also market diseases.
Take Restless Legs Syndrome, a disorder that few had heard of until recently, when ads began popping up to raise interest in the drugs that treat it. According to the ads, the disorder is characterized by unpleasant sensations in the legs accompanied by an uncontrollable urge to move them. Dig a little deeper and you'll find that the drugs that treat Restless Legs Syndrome are the same ones that treat Parkinson's disease - raising the question of whether pharmaceutical companies "created" Restless Legs Syndrome in order to sell more drugs.
It's a contentious issue.
Doctors disagree over whether pharmaceutical companies create diseases or simply bring attention to little-known disorders. And certainly the industry has done a tremendous amount to improve medicine.
But has it gone too far?
WIRED SCIENCE explores the business of disease and the truth about Restless Legs Syndrome - is it a legitimate disorder or something created to boost drug sales? Read also our web original feature Art tackles Big Pharma about what a few creative people are doing to raise awareness about direct-to-consumer advertising and its influence on American society.
their is many comments on this article link below
http://www.pbs.org/kcet/wiredscience...f_disease.html
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with much love,
lou_lou
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by
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, on Flickr
pd documentary - part 2 and 3
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Resolve to be tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving, and tolerant with the weak and the wrong. Sometime in your life you will have been all of these.
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