Healthy Skepticism Library item: 10870

Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.

Publication type: Journal Article

Vlassov V.
Drug and poison
BMJ 2007 Jul 13; 335:(7610):epub
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/eletters/335/7610/74

Notes:

Rapid Response to:
Richard Smith
Should medical journals carry drug advertising? Yes
BMJ 2007; 335: 74

Full text:

What is a drug for one is a poison for another. What R. Smith describes as a source of independence may be the worst dependence. Why not look at what is going in the real world?

In the real world some first class journals wear on every issue the ad from the one and the same company. Many second class journals do the same. They do this despite this practice being specifically known as damaging, and they do this specifically for getting more money, to enjoy a kind of dependence. In the real world journals strongly depend on advertisement income. Not 20% of them, but, as I know, for example, in the post Soviet space, almost all journals depend mostly on advertisements. More, the most prosperous journals bring profits to the owner, and the owner presses the journal to raise more money through advertisements. In this case the owner does not reduce its pressure on the content of the journal, but introduces another line of pressure – the demand for more profits.

In the real world all advertisers enjoy some influence on the content of the journals to support their advertisements. And if one advertiser succeeds in that, this will not lead to complaints from competitor. Opposite: competitor advertiser will demand that the journal provides a similar service for them. E.g. in Russia these days the publication of advertisements with the supporting “scientific” paper is a usual advertiser’s package. Why do journals do that? “Because they are funded mostly by drug advertising” – this is the explanation for newspapers by R. Smith, but this explanation is applicable to medical journals. Only a small proportion of medical journals is supported mostly by subscription, as I know in the field.

R. Smith says, “advertising is there for all to see and easy to police”. It is not so simple. Journals practise insertions, which makes policing almost impossible. “We are conditioned to (advertisements) and discount it,” says R. Smith, and it is again not quite right, because as I mentioned earlier advertisements are these days “evidence based” and supported by accompanying “scientific papers”.

Fortunately, I agree with the final recommendation: readers, skip the ads! But I would add another recommendation: readers, condemn editors of journals for manipulating the content in the interest of advertisers.

Competing interests: None declared