Advertising: Australian doctors call for ban on drug company ads

Australia's ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation,) reports that the authors of research into pharmaceutical marketing have called for a ban on drug company ads being inserted in doctors' prescribing software.

The Medical Journal of Australia has voiced concerns that the pharmaceutical industry spends up to three times as much on marketing as it does on research and development.

The president of the Doctors' Reform Society, Dr Tim Woodruff, says "Confronting every doctor when they're writing their prescription, they now have advertisements for various drugs."

Dr Woodruff believes too many doctors are prescribing new and expensive drugs when cheaper alternatives are available, and this fuels the cost blow-out in the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme.

The Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme subsidises a selected list of medicines. The Government lists drugs on the advice of an expert committee, the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee