Chantix Ad

I just saw this ad for a pharmaceutical that can help you quit smoking. A couple of thoughts instantly caught me.

First, I was at my computer listening to but not watching the computer. What caught my attention initially was the list of possible side effects. The calm, re-assuring voice said: "If you have feelings of severe depression, thoughts of suicide or take suicidal actions, stop taking Chantix immediately and contact your doctor." I chuckled to myself as I thought in the voice, "If you kill yourself, contact your doctor immediately."

There was a continuing list of worsening conditions far worse than death. "Some users may experience nausea, sleeplessness and vivid dreams while taking Chantix." Okay so what's the difference between taking Chantix and quitting cold turkey? These are normal symptoms of quitting.

Lastly, what really made me think this is one of the most dangerous confidence scams I've ever seen is when the soothing voice said "in clinical trials, users of Chantix were 44 percent successful at quitting smoking over placebo groups who's success rate was 18 percent over a 12-week period." So while I admit I'm no statistician, what this says to me is that if it takes on average 7 times to quit smoking, the placebo did very little to improve that success rate - maybe 2 percent?

It essentially gives you a 3-fold better chance than if you simply decide to quit and engage in some cognitive behavioural thought, decide you really want to quit and don't stop trying. Now, I have not yet been successful in quitting so I will never be too critical of methods that work for some people. But the sales job of a chemical which takes just as long with very little improvement and threatens to send you into dark depression or worse, to kill yourself, is just a tad unnerving.

Pharmaceutical ads ought to be made illegal. They distort the patient-doctor relationship and give people false expectations. Companies spend far too much on advertising while complaining of too-limited lifetimes of patents. More money ought to be directed back to research and development. No more blue pills, no more ads about erections lasting longer than 4 hours thank you very much!