Dangerous bedfellows, industry and medicine : life savers or disease makers

Advertising of products and services has become an accepted and integral part of everyday life, and advancements in mass media technology have made it easy to convey information to a large proportion of the population. However, when addressing health related services and products, the messages contained in today's advertisements have taken on a new purpose and tone. The healthcare industry in North America, especially pharmaceutical companies, and to a lesser extent the diagnostic imaging and the medical device industry, use direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising to convey a message to a target population. On its face, the promotion of health awareness is an acceptable and worthy practice, but ethical concerns are raised when the health industry plays an instrumental role in creating "illnesses" or "conditions" for which they are providing treatments.At one time, to protect health consumers, legislation and regulations prohibited directly advertising of prescription healthcare products and services to consumers, since it was thought that physicians were the ones best equipped to deal with this information. However, times have changed, and DTC advertising now is openly allowed in some countries, and in others in some narrowly specific situations.This thesis examines the ethical and practical issues raised by this development, arguing that the negative consequences of permitting Direct-to-Consumer advertising far exceeds any positive benefits. If governments do not take an active role in preventing the further commercialization of medicine, Canada (and other countries as well) may be destined to become a nation of worried well