Slick TV commercials are poor prescription

YOU'VE GOT no talent, no friends and no personality. Let's face it: You need a new shampoo.

We laugh at those ridiculous commercials, even as we reach past the cheap stuff for brand-name bottles on store shelves. There's no great harm if we spend a few extra dollars in pursuit of beauty and bliss, but what if the product those ads are peddling is a pill?

Specifically, what if it's a prescription medication that costs hundreds of dollars a bottle and has some nasty side effects?

Before 1997, the United States placed strict limits on advertisements for prescription drugs. Then the Food and Drug Administration loosened the rules and allowed pharmaceutical companies to spend more time touting their products' benefits and less time on their potentially adverse consequences.

The drug industry has spent more than $10 billion on advertising in the past decade for medicines that treat herpes, high cholesterol, urinary tract problems, depression and other conditions.

On the bright side, the ads raise awareness about common health problems and encourage people to talk to their doctors.

But the hard sells and the emotional appeals worry physicians, consumer groups and advocates for the aging. They fear too many Americans are taking medicines that are unnecessary, unsafe or too expensive. Members of Congress are starting to pay attention as they face demands to do something about soaring health care costs.

Drug companies continue to provide regular evidence that they are in need of tougher regulations. Merck and Schering Plough took their popular ads for Vytorin and Zetia off the air recently after Congress inquired about research showing the drugs were no better at reducing cholesterol than cheaper generics.

The companies had spent $200 million annually on advertising, including the series promoting Vytorin's value in fighting cholesterol from fatty foods and genes inherited from funny-looking relatives. Sales of the drugs topped $5 billion last year.

Merck and Pfizer pulled painkillers Vioxx and Celebrex off the market when trials revealed increased risk of heart problems.

Congressional snooping alone has helped to clean up some of the more egregious problems within the industry, but a scattershot approach is inadequate to police the system.

The Consumers Union, the non-profit publisher of Consumer Reports, is calling for a three-year moratorium on advertisements for new drugs. That would give doctors time to gauge a pill's track record for side effects and effectiveness before they are inundated with demands for the drug.

Sure, doctors should have the backbone to say "no" to unreasonable demands, and most do. But sensible regulations would help ensure health professionals' voices aren't being drowned out by your TV set and your Grandpa Alfredo.