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EU's Pharmaceutical Forum to Relax Advertising Restrictions

After a three-year long process, the Pharmaceutical Forum in the European Union concluded last week with an important decision on patient information programs sponsored by pharmaceutical companies. Co-chairs Gunter Verheugen, vice president of the European Commission, and Commissioner Androulla Vassiliou both agreed that recommendations by the Forum will benefit patients, healthcare budgets and pharmaceutical innovations.

While "the ban on advertising of prescription medicines to the general public should continue," the Forum has loosened the restrictions on pharmaceutical companies providing information to patients. According to one of the recommendations (found in the Final Conclusions and Recommendations of the High Level Pharmaceutical Forum) by the Forum, Member States, pharmaceutical companies and other stakeholders "are encouraged to regularly exchange information in order to achieve the objectives set out in the conclusions, namely… to inform healthcare professionals and patients on the most effective drugs."

Many think that direct-to-consumer advertising can lead to inappropriate use of medicines, but the Forum believes that no one knows a product better than its manufacturer. Therefore they should be involved with national authorities, "having early dialogue during product development to improve the generation of appropriate data as far as possible" and "developing a common approach to quality assurance of information."

According to the Financial Times, a draft of the legislation "calls for changes to the European law on medicines' advertising to allow companies to circulate 'objective and unbiased' information on their drugs' uses, side-effects and prices." This places a greater responsibility on pharmaceutical manufacturers to ensure that they are continually providing accurate and reliable information to the public.