Sociology

Modern day electronic and print media is flooded with advertisements of prescription drugs for all sorts of illnesses and ailments. It has become virtually impossible to browse through television channels or through a magazine without coming across such an advertisement. This paper shall attempt to address this phenomenon and shall shed light on the advantages and disadvantages of its occurrence.

The increased advertisement of prescriptions drugs facilitates the education of the everyday man about the uses and utility of prescription drugs. It gives the consumer a sense of awareness about the implications of the drugs that are taken. It is in the most rare of circumstances that consumers take out the time to consider the uses and relevance of the prescription drugs they take (Veracity, 2005).

Therefore, the high frequency of magazine and television advertisements allows consumers to become aware of the uses and relevance of prescription drugs that a consumer would otherwise rarely take out time to consider looking at.

On the other hand, the increased marketing of prescription drugs through the electronic and print media is not without its significant disadvantages. Prescription drugs are only provided upon a doctors prescription because of their high degree of sensitivity and while it may seemingly appear that the increased advertisement of a prescription drug will have no implications for the company, the increased advertisement actually serves to stimulate consumer demand for their drug from doctors (Veracity, 2005). Doctors are faced with the ordeal of knowing that there is very little commitment that the patient will give to the treatment unless the patient is prescribed the drug of hisher choice and are therefore in a position where they have to prescribe the drug that the patient demands.

It is evident from the above brief discussion that the increased advertisement of prescription drugs has more direct adverse implications than it has positive affects since the increase in knowledge ends up being translated into a tendency to consume drugs that are either not required in the first place or not the best ones for the treatment in question.