(D-Onondaga) today introduced a plan that requires drug companies to fully disclose how they spend their marketing money and bans lavish gifts such as extravagant trips and meals to doctors.
"The amount of money big drug companies spend on marketing dwarfs the amount of money they spend on research and
development," Simpson said. "Clearly, they are motivated by profits and not the health of
The House Democratic plan would:
- Require companies to report all drug advertising and marketing expenditures,
including gifts to doctors and other health care workers.
- Require companies to report research and development
expenditures.
- Ban lavish drug company gifts to doctors and limit gifts to $100 worth a
year.
- Establish a searchable Web site that details drug companies' marketing
expenses and gifts to doctors, which would be maintained by the Department of Community Health.
Big drug companies spend more than $21 billion annually on marketing.[1] Merck, maker of now-banned Vioxx, spent more than $160 million on an aggressive advertising campaign in 2000; as a result, sales of Vioxx quadrupled to $1.5 billion.[2] Vioxx may have caused heart attacks or cardiac deaths in up to 139,000 Americans, based on Merck's own studies, before it was pulled from shelves in 2004.[3]
"Big drug companies make billions of dollars off the products they make, and, at least in the case of Vioxx, with
blatant disregard for their products' safety," Byrum said. "That's wrong, and our legislation aims to shine a light on
these shady practices. By adding another layer of accountability, we will protect