The big industry of big pharma ads

From Harper’s January 2018 index:

Amount the US pharmaceutical industry spent in 2016 on ads for prescription drugs: $6,400,000,000

Number of countries in which direct-to-consumer pharmaceutical ads are legal: 2

$6.4 billion? Holy moly, what a depressing figure. Think about how much healthcare that would buy.

In case you’re curious, our partner in crime is New Zealand.

In case you’re still curious, permitting DTC advertising isĀ a terrible idea that can only be satisfactorily explained by the power of lobbying.

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