The Fact
The same JAMA analysis counted about 79,000 direct-to-consumer prescription-drug advertisements in 1997 and about 4.6 million in 2016. The 2016 total included roughly 663,000 television commercials.
What This Means
The change was not only more money spent on advertising. The number of drug advertisements placed into the public information environment increased enormously, making prescription-drug messaging far more frequent and familiar.
Sources
- Schwartz LM, Woloshin S. Medical Marketing in the United States, 1997-2016. JAMA. 2019;321(1):80-96.