House Subcommittee Investigates DTC Advertising

The Oversight and Investigation Subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee held a hearing on May 8 on Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) prescription drug advertising entitled “Direct-to-Consumer Advertising: Marketing, Education, or Deception?” Subcommittee Chairman Bart Stupak (D-MI) questioned the need for any DTC advertising in general, but the hearing focused on three specific television ads. The ads in question were the Lipitor ads featuring Dr. Robert Jarvik, the Vytorin ads that ran until January 2008 and ads for Procrit that ran from 1998 to 2005. There was no mention of any print ads that may have been placed for those drugs.

Subcommittee Ranking Member Rep. John Shimkus (R-IL) questioned the need for the hearing, stressing that a provision in last year’s Food and Drug Administration (FDA) reform bill gave the FDA new power, in the form of civil penalties, for advertisements that are found to be false or misleading. However, both Reps. Dingell and Stupak vowed to continue their investigation into DTC advertising and indicated that they plan to hold additional hearings this year.

As a follow up to the hearing, Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman John Dingell (D-MI), and Rep. Stupak sent letters to the pharmaceutical companies that testified during the hearing, asking that they agree to new guidelines for DTC advertising. One of the requests is that the companies agree to a two-year moratorium on advertising for new prescription drugs.

NAA expects that this issue will continue to receive significant attention and expects that additional legislation will be introduced this year.

First Published:
May 28, 2008