Big Pharma, Mercantilism and HIV
It was bound to happen. With the development of anti retroviral therapies equally successful against HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, the Pharmaceutical industry had to enter the competitive arena of the mercantilisation of AIDS’s treatments and what best than using scary marketing techniques to sale drugs to fight a frightening disease?
Whilst GlaxoSmithKline has been advertising its protease inhibitor Lexiva over the background of a shark infested sea, Bristol-Myers Squibb showed an image of a toilet and says, “Ask your doctor if there are HIV medications with a low risk of diarrhea” a side effect associated with the HIV drug Kaletra made by its competitor, Abbott.
Glaxo told the Wall Street Journal that their ads are “educational” and appropriate. “While we acknowledge that some people may find the headline and imagery of the materials to be provocative, GSK stands firmly behind the ads and their underlying message: Patients considering changing HIV therapy ought to consult closely with their physician to fully understand the near and potential long-term health implications of such changes,” said company spokesman Marc Meachem. Bristol-Myers spokesman said his company’s ad were appropriate too.
The belief of “appropriateness” has to be understood in the context of the pharmaceutical industry, where it is appropriate to blackmail governments which try to make ART available to PLWHA, where it is appropriate to multiply the price of ART by 5 to discourage competition, where it is appropriate to overprice life-saving medicines even when sold in developing countries, and where it is appropriate to lobby political party to guarantee business privileges.
“Such comparison ads are common elsewhere,” reports the WSJ, “but the pharmaceutical industry traditionally sold HIV drugs with images of hope and by explaining the benefits of their treatments. The tough new tack has some patient groups unsettled, saying it could scare off patients.”
Showing once more its complete lack of sensitivity, the Pharmaceutical industry also unconsciously plays the game of AIDS denialists who claim that it ARV kill people, a ludicrous claim that they will certainly try to support with information gathered from competitive adverts produced exacerbating ARV’s side effects.
Once more it is those in needs of ARV that will lose in the big money game.
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