Dear Mr. Kennedy,
Of the many issues you will tackle as Secretary of Health and Human Services, we implore you to work with FCC Commissioner Brenden Carr and immediately put an end to pharmaceutical companies advertising prescription drugs on television. This should be one of your earliest moves in the Trump administration. Why is this so timely?
The sheer amount of dollars being spent on TV advertising by “Big Pharma” should raise suspicion among those who care about accuracy in media and information being consumed by the public.
It is an old trick for an industry to buy off the news media for favorable coverage.
Historic Precedent to Ban Unhealthy Ads on Television
When evidence of the dangers of smoking cigarettes began to emerge in the 1950s, news organizations were reluctant to expose “Big Tobacco” because it was responsible for an abundance of media ad revenue. The same synergistic relationship exists today with “Big Pharma” and television news.
Similarly, as Big Tobacco began buying off the TV news more than 70 years ago, Big Pharma is doing that today.
The incessant drumbeat of COVID boosters, RSV injections, and flu shot ads is run alongside news reporters covering up vaccine side effects, including increased cases of myocarditis, anaphylaxis, psychosis, and/or early death.
Nowhere is this more evident than with Novo Nordisk A/S’s type 2 diabetes drug Ozempic. While this drug may offer benefits to the millions of Americans who suffer from type 2 diabetes (some surveys place the number of Americans afflicted with type 2 diabetes at nearly 10%, with more than 30% considered pre-diabetic), at what cost? If your insurance doesn’t cover Ozempic, your monthly cost will be nearly $1,000. And you will be “hooked” for life.
Concurrently, what about the shameless promotion of Ozempic as an aid for weight loss? Can you watch a program on the nightly news on one of the alphabet networks or cable news without seeing ads for Ozempic touting its benefits to lose weight?
And what about the genre of late-night so-called comics like vax-shill Stephen Colbert? The late-night TV category is dying, with Colbert (CBS), Jimmy Fallon (NBC), and Jimmy Kimmel (ABC) suffering historic low ratings. If not propped up by “Big Pharma” ad dollars, will a ban on ads for prescription drugs be the final nail in their coffins? Let’s hope so, as all three ceased being funny years ago.
The Long-term Cost of the Chemicals in Our Food Chain
We know you are already on the record as having intentions of outlawing Big Pharma ads for prescription drugs on television. Today, among high-income countries, only the U.S. and New Zealand allow for such advertising. Almost all other countries are fully knowledgeable of the conflict between ad dollars and news reporting.
The longer this obvious conflict persists, the more the public will be misled and lied to about the real dangers of prescription drugs and the intentions of Big Pharma to buy off the news media to hide these dangers. A ban on this type of advertising will go a long way toward keeping the news media honest—or perhaps putting the worst of them out of the misinformation business altogether.
Among the many items on your agenda, once you take office, this is probably the easiest of them. Our broadcast news outlets operate under a license from the FCC and are obligated to serve the public interest at all times. Taking money from Big Pharma to cover up or lie about the potential damage the public will suffer through the use of their products cannot be tolerated any longer.
We both applaud your passion to Make America Healthy Again. Count us in.
