Healthy Skepticism Library item: 1290

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Publication type: news

Templeton S.
Drug firm's obesity 'advert' should be banned, say GPs
The Sunday Herald 2003 Jun 15

Full text:

A CAMPAIGN by the manu-facturer of the obesity drug Xenical to raise public awareness of the health risks of carrying excess weight is in breach of advertising rules and should be immediately withdrawn, doctors have claimed.

Drug giant Roche, which makes Xenical, is targeting overweight Scots in a month-long drive with advertisements in a Scottish newspaper and GPs’ waiting rooms.

Pharmaceutical companies are banned from promoting prescription drugs directly to the public in the UK although the practice, called direct-to-consumer advertising, is permitted in the US. The regulation is in place to prevent patients rushing to their doctors to demand expensive medicines which they have seen advertised on TV or in newspapers.

Doctors say the obesity ads are an elaborate form of direct-to-patient advertising. They do not mention Xenical but carry the Roche logo and say ‘Trying to lose weight? We can make temptation old news.’

Patients are then invited to write off for more information or call a Freephone number where they are greeted by Dr Ian Campbell, a GP who specialises in obesity and is also chairman of the National Obesity Forum. Roche is a sponsor of the National Obesity Forum and there are close links between the two organisations.

Campbell has called for the number of people being prescribed obesity drugs in the UK to be doubled.

Professor Joe Collier, editor of Drug And Therapeutics Bulletin and professor of medicines policy at St George’s Hospital in London, claims there is a clear conflict of interest in Roche running the campaign.

‘This is not health awareness, it is a campaign to promote Roche products. There is no question in my mind that this is promotion of Roche products and the ads should be withdrawn immediately. By definition, information designed to increase the sales of a product is promotion.

‘The ad says ‘We can make temptation old news.’ The ‘we’ is Roche so they are telling us that Roche, the manufacturer of an obesity drug, can help.’

Dr Des Spence, a Glasgow GP and spokesman for the No Free Lunch movement (which opposes NHS staff taking cash or hospitality from drug firms) added: ‘In my view this is a form of direct-to-consumer marketing. It is tarted up but is the same thing. I wouldn’t have thought that Roche, the manufacturers of obesity drugs, could possibly be the right people to run a health awareness campaign. They have a vested interest.’

Campbell admitted that, ideally, the obesity awareness campaign would be run by an organisation with no conflict of interest, but insisted that this was not happening.

‘I certainly think there is a need for greater public awareness of the health risks of obesity and the potential solutions. Ideally, this would all be forthcoming from some agency that does not have a commercial interest, but the reality is that it is not being done to the degree that we would like.

‘I do think the campaign is justifiable and should be able to point people in the right direction. This should not cause everyone to visit their GP on Monday morning. For the vast majority of people who are overweight what is required is a sensible lifestyle change. A minority of people would need medical treatment. For that group, I do believe that medication has a significant role to play.

‘One of the issues is patchy access to medication. There is a patchy provision, either because managers believe this should be rationed or because they feel that weight should be lost through lifestyle change. The reality is that lots of patients cannot achieve weight loss with lifestyle change alone and they may have another illness which would make this medication justifiable.’

He added: ‘Anyone with a body mass index (BMI) of more than 30 would be eligible for medication, so one in five of the population will be eligible. Medication is not suitable in all cases, however. In some cases people will want to lose weight but will not lose enough through lifestyle changes. In such cases we would use medication, providing the patient had the correct motivation.

‘We could easily double the number of people who are taking medication.’

Last week a report commissioned by Roche, and carried out by a health economist at Glasgow University, showed that illness linked to obesity cost the NHS as much to treat as smoking-related diseases.

It revealed that the bill for treating overweight Scots is more than £171 million a year. It also pointed out that only 2% of this money was spent on actually treating obesity, with the rest spent on tackling diseases related to being overweight.

More than half (52%) of Scots are overweight, and 21% are classed as obese. However, consumer research conducted by Roche shows that only one third of those who are overweight know they fall into this category, and only a quarter are willing to do anything about it. By alerting the public to the health risks of being overweight, Roche hopes to persuade more people to take action.

Kate Reid, senior product manager for Xenical, said: ‘This campaign is not intended to educate about our products but to create awareness of the disease. It is about empowering people with the knowledge that your health can suffer if you are obese. If people recognise that there is a problem then this should encourage them to take some action and get some support.

‘Very few consumers go and talk to their GP about weight loss. Health care professionals are the experts in co-morbidity (multiple health problems). They are most likely to be able to help. Health care professionals are the right people to be talking to. People think ‘why should I visit my GP for weight loss?’ We are not saying everyone should go to their GP, only those who really need to lose weight, cannot do it on their own, and may have related health problems.’

Catherine Smith, 49, from Nottingham, lost one and a half stones after taking the drug Xenical for 12 months. She has peripheral vascular disease and had suffered a stroke. Losing weight was important for her health.

‘I had a series of operations a couple of years ago and it is very hard when you are in that condition to take proper exercise,’ she explained.

‘I went to my doctor and he suggested these tablets and they were brilliant for me.

‘There are so many overweight people and this could really help them.’