(NaturalNews) The H.J. Heinz company, most famous for producing Heinz brand ketchup, has been reprimanded by the United Kingdom's Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) over an ad for its Nurture-brand infant formula.
According to the ASA, Heinz made "unsubstantiated" and "unacceptable" claims that its product could support the growth of infant brains, bodies and immune systems.
The ad, produced by the Abbot Mead Vickers BBDO agency, stated that each child needs a "special combination of nutrients to sustain the incredible growth in its brain, body and immune system." It then went on to state that Heinz had produced Nurture specifically in order to "provide for those three essential aspects of growth."
The commercial concluded by saying that Nurture would help "nourish, protect and develop your baby."
Three complaints were submitted to the ASA claiming that there was insufficient scientific evidence to support Heinz's claims regarding immunity and child development. When questioned by the ASA, Heinz claimed that the inclusion of iron, prebiotics and nucleotides would "protect" the immune system, omega-3s and omega-6s would help children's brains and eyes "develop," and milk protein and calcium would provide nourishment.
The ASA rejected these claims, ruling that the commercial falsely implied specific health benefits rather than general nutritional content.
"We concluded, therefore, that the claim was unsubstantiated and the ad was unacceptable," the ASA said.
The decision follows a similar case in October, in which French company Danone claimed in ads that its probiotic-fortified yogurt drink Actimel was "scientifically proven to help support your kids' defenses." The ASA also rejected this ad.
Christine Haigh of the Children's Food Campaign expressed concern over the prevalence of unsubstantiated health claims in ads for children's food products.
"We believe the Food Standards Agency needs to investigate how widespread this practice is," she said.
For example, Gerber has recently begun marketing baby food in the United States in packaging claiming that the product "helps support brain and eye development."
Sources for this story include: www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/wor... ; www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/jan/1....
Showing posts with label ads. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ads. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Doritos ads represent sick, demented nature of junk food companies and their products
(NaturalNews) Junk food advertising has reached a new low with the recent Doritos "Crash the Super Bowl" ads which portray Doritos consumers as violent murderers who will kill fellow human beings to get a bag of Doritos.
One Doritos ad portrays a man backing out of a parking lot when his car strikes an innocent person who drops a bag of Doritos and falls to the ground behind the car. Rather than trying to help the innocent victim, this man throws his car into reverse and drives over the victim, killing him with the vehicle and stealing the bag of Doritos.
The message? Doritos are so valuable that it's okay to kill people just to score a bag. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1T_D...)
A second Doritos ad shows two loser-looking gym bums being attacked by an insane junk food ninja who uses Doritos chips as throwing stars to murder the guy who stole his bag of Doritos. The message here? Doritos are so valuable that it's okay to kill others to defend your snack. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bRS...)
A third Doritos ad shows one elderly man attacking a young man with a stun gun in order to buy the last bag of Doritos from a vending machine (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4YN...). Same gratuitous violence. Same message: Committing violent acts against others is perfectly acceptable when you're pursuing a bag of Doritos.
Yet another Doritos ad shows two grown men smacking each other in the face to decide which loser has to go buy more Doritos. The loser ends up with a black eye after being punched so hard he flies through the air and lands on a coffee table, shattering it. Gee, why not just use the women in this role and make it a wife-beating commercial? (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpRb...)
Doritos marketing executives apparently think these commercials showing gratuitous acts of violence and murder are going to help them sell more Doritos. Maybe they've been eating too much of their own product and their brain function has been suppressed by all the MSG found in Doritos... because these ads aren't funny, they're sick!
"Demented" might be a better term. It's hard to see the humor when there's so much realistic violence in the way. And yet somehow Frito-Lay executives gave these ads the big thumbs up. Let's use violence to sell junk foods!
It sort of makes sense, actually: Junk food consumption is correlated with violent crime. Virtually all the criminals in prison across the country are nutritionally imbalanced due to their consumption of processed junk foods and their lack of sufficient nutritional supplementation. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if a study revealed that fried snack foods like Doritos are a favorite food among violent criminals. These are, after all, the kind of people depicted in some Doritos advertisements.
In my view, the violent Doritos commercials accurately reflect the senseless, violent behavior that typifies people (younger males, mostly) who consume large quantities of processed junk foods, sugary soft drinks and gimmicky "sports drinks." These are the people who end up being put on antidepressants and other psychotropic drugs, after which they sometimes end up in a school shooting rampage.
It might make a good Doritos commercial, actually: A kid grows up on junk food and diet soda laced with aspartame. He's drugged up on Ritalin and Prozac. One day he brings a semiautomatic rifle to school, barges into a classroom and opens fire on his classmates, shooting and screaming, "I WANT MY F*@!KING DORITOS!"
Hilarious, huh? Some people think so. The Frito-Lay executives apparently think this kind of violence is appropriate for mainstream television. This is the kind of imagery they're using to try to convince people to buy their products! How sick is that?
This show is the single most popular broadcast in the world of Idiocracy. When this parody movie first came out, it seemed impossible to imagine a world full of people who were so stupid that they just sit around watching some guy get kicked in the balls over and over again... but guess what? Idiocracy has become reality! Doritos has achieved the distinction of being the first mainstream consumer product company to produce a series of advertisements that are intellectually equivalent to "Ow, My Balls!"
Read more about the dangers of MSG here: http://www.naturalnews.com/msg.html
Being a fried snack food, Doritos also contain acrylamides -- toxic substances formed when carbohydrates are cooked a high temperatures. Acrylamides are linked to cancer and other serious diseases. (http://www.naturalnews.com/acrylami...)
One study shows that eating acrylamides increases the risk of kidney cancer by 59 percent (http://www.naturalnews.com/024585_c...).
PepsiCo, the parent company that makes Doritos, claims that its product isn't made with genetically modified corn, but tests conducted by GreenPeace proved that Doritos sold in India actually did contain GM corn varieties MON 863 and NK 603 (http://indiatoday.intoday.in/site/S...).
So eating a bag of Doritos involves not only the ingestion of MSG and cancer-causing acrylamides; it may also expose you to genetically modified corn that has been scientifically linked to internal organ damage. (See books by Jeffrey Smith for loads of research on that...)
So now all the violence actually starts to make sense: People who eat Doritos might be brain damaged from the chemicals in the product. And because they're brain damaged, they have lost the higher brain functions of critical thinking or expressing human compassion. They are operating from their lower "reptilian" brain stem functions which respond to two things: Sex and violence.
No wonder the Doritos ads are focused on sex and violence.
One Doritos ad portrays a man backing out of a parking lot when his car strikes an innocent person who drops a bag of Doritos and falls to the ground behind the car. Rather than trying to help the innocent victim, this man throws his car into reverse and drives over the victim, killing him with the vehicle and stealing the bag of Doritos.
The message? Doritos are so valuable that it's okay to kill people just to score a bag. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1T_D...)
A second Doritos ad shows two loser-looking gym bums being attacked by an insane junk food ninja who uses Doritos chips as throwing stars to murder the guy who stole his bag of Doritos. The message here? Doritos are so valuable that it's okay to kill others to defend your snack. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bRS...)
A third Doritos ad shows one elderly man attacking a young man with a stun gun in order to buy the last bag of Doritos from a vending machine (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4YN...). Same gratuitous violence. Same message: Committing violent acts against others is perfectly acceptable when you're pursuing a bag of Doritos.
Yet another Doritos ad shows two grown men smacking each other in the face to decide which loser has to go buy more Doritos. The loser ends up with a black eye after being punched so hard he flies through the air and lands on a coffee table, shattering it. Gee, why not just use the women in this role and make it a wife-beating commercial? (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpRb...)
A common theme: Violence against innocent people
What's the common theme of all these Doritos television commercials? Acts of senseless violence committed against fellow human beings.Doritos marketing executives apparently think these commercials showing gratuitous acts of violence and murder are going to help them sell more Doritos. Maybe they've been eating too much of their own product and their brain function has been suppressed by all the MSG found in Doritos... because these ads aren't funny, they're sick!
"Demented" might be a better term. It's hard to see the humor when there's so much realistic violence in the way. And yet somehow Frito-Lay executives gave these ads the big thumbs up. Let's use violence to sell junk foods!
It sort of makes sense, actually: Junk food consumption is correlated with violent crime. Virtually all the criminals in prison across the country are nutritionally imbalanced due to their consumption of processed junk foods and their lack of sufficient nutritional supplementation. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if a study revealed that fried snack foods like Doritos are a favorite food among violent criminals. These are, after all, the kind of people depicted in some Doritos advertisements.
In my view, the violent Doritos commercials accurately reflect the senseless, violent behavior that typifies people (younger males, mostly) who consume large quantities of processed junk foods, sugary soft drinks and gimmicky "sports drinks." These are the people who end up being put on antidepressants and other psychotropic drugs, after which they sometimes end up in a school shooting rampage.
It might make a good Doritos commercial, actually: A kid grows up on junk food and diet soda laced with aspartame. He's drugged up on Ritalin and Prozac. One day he brings a semiautomatic rifle to school, barges into a classroom and opens fire on his classmates, shooting and screaming, "I WANT MY F*@!KING DORITOS!"
Hilarious, huh? Some people think so. The Frito-Lay executives apparently think this kind of violence is appropriate for mainstream television. This is the kind of imagery they're using to try to convince people to buy their products! How sick is that?
Ow, My Balls!
If you've ever seen the movie Idiocracy, you may remember the popular TV show being watched by the dumbed-down, brain-numbed junk food consumers who inhabit the world depicted in the film. That show was called, "Ow, My Balls!" and it consisted of random acts of violence against the testicles of the show host who is seen being kicked in the balls, falling on his balls, being hit in the balls by a wrecking crane and other similar acts. (http://www.naturalnews.com/021558.html)This show is the single most popular broadcast in the world of Idiocracy. When this parody movie first came out, it seemed impossible to imagine a world full of people who were so stupid that they just sit around watching some guy get kicked in the balls over and over again... but guess what? Idiocracy has become reality! Doritos has achieved the distinction of being the first mainstream consumer product company to produce a series of advertisements that are intellectually equivalent to "Ow, My Balls!"
Doritos contain MSG
Doritos are, of course, a processed junk food made with mosodium glutamate -- a taste-enhancing chemical that experts like Dr. Russell Blaylock link to obesity, food addictions, headaches and neurological damage. MSG is an excitotoxin that's used along with huge amounts of processed salt to enhance the flavor of dead foods like Doritos.Read more about the dangers of MSG here: http://www.naturalnews.com/msg.html
Being a fried snack food, Doritos also contain acrylamides -- toxic substances formed when carbohydrates are cooked a high temperatures. Acrylamides are linked to cancer and other serious diseases. (http://www.naturalnews.com/acrylami...)
One study shows that eating acrylamides increases the risk of kidney cancer by 59 percent (http://www.naturalnews.com/024585_c...).
PepsiCo, the parent company that makes Doritos, claims that its product isn't made with genetically modified corn, but tests conducted by GreenPeace proved that Doritos sold in India actually did contain GM corn varieties MON 863 and NK 603 (http://indiatoday.intoday.in/site/S...).
So eating a bag of Doritos involves not only the ingestion of MSG and cancer-causing acrylamides; it may also expose you to genetically modified corn that has been scientifically linked to internal organ damage. (See books by Jeffrey Smith for loads of research on that...)
So now all the violence actually starts to make sense: People who eat Doritos might be brain damaged from the chemicals in the product. And because they're brain damaged, they have lost the higher brain functions of critical thinking or expressing human compassion. They are operating from their lower "reptilian" brain stem functions which respond to two things: Sex and violence.
No wonder the Doritos ads are focused on sex and violence.
Friday, December 11, 2009
Big Pharma greed: free drugs are being pushed on the Internet to hook consumers
(NaturalNews) If you have a common condition like high cholesterol or asthma, you'll probably surf the Internet for info -- and odds are you'll be directed to a slick Big Pharma-sponsored Web homepage. It will appear to be oh-so-helpful. In fact, the drug company just can't wait to offer you free samples or a one-time discount on a top-selling prescription medication. New research concludes, however, this is not only a way to hawk (and hook people on) expensive prescription meds they don't even necessarily need but it's also a way to collect personal information about you so you can be targeted for more drug sales.
The study, recently published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, shows how Big Pharma's marketing tactics can be misleading and downright tricky. The drug company-backed web sites contain all sorts of positive hype about the drugs being pushed, including testimonials from patients who appear glowing with good health and enthusiastic words for their prescription fix. But what about risks, efficacy and side effects? Don't bother looking too close for that information.
The research team, headed by Dr. William G. Weppner of the University of Washington (UW) Department of Medicine and the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Boise, Idaho, found that hard facts -- quantitative information on the medication's indications for use, effectiveness and risks -- are rarely mentioned. The omission is so glaring that the researchers are calling for additional studies to determine if Big Pharma's free offers are actually trying to distract or divert patients from reading risk information.
What's more, the freebie drug offers may be pushing people to take medications they don't need. Patients surfing the web typically find a web site with a list of symptoms and information about a drug that will supposedly treat their health problems -- all they have to do is download and print the coupon or voucher on the web site, take it to a doctor to obtain a prescription and then give the coupon and prescription to a pharmacist. The researchers cited evidence that many physicians' decisions to prescribe specific drugs are influenced by patient requests based on direct-to-consumer advertisements and by the availability of free samples. In fact, the study found evidence that the freebie offers have a huge impact on exactly what drugs are being prescribed. Out of 50 of the most frequently prescribed medications, more than half have Internet free sample offers.
And just how "free" are the Internet offered drug samples? Not very. The study concluded that people who take the drug companies up on these deals will have to pay to keep taking the shilled brand-name medication -- and in most cases there's no low-cost generic equivalent. "Many of these discounts are aimed at co-pays, which could increase costs to consumers via health insurance premiums," Dr. Weppner said in a statement to the press.
The study calculated that the average annual retail cost for the drugs being pushed with free samples was $1,559, with a range of $84 to $5,668. The total yearly value of the free samples for these medications had an average of $86 and the total yearly value of the discounts offered by Big Pharma-sponsored web sites had a mean of $75, with a range of $5 to $300. In other words, the coupon or voucher covered only about 5 percent of the expensive yearly bill for drugs that were often only prescribed in the first place because people took the free coupon to their doctors.
And if you think these revelations about Big Pharma's questionable marketing-to-consumers-directly tactics couldn't get any worse in terms of greed or questionable ethics, there's even more to this story. The new study revealed that the pharmaceutical industry is gathering personal information on consumers with their freebie drug racket.
To obtain the free offers, 71 percent of the web sites require a host of personal information including e-mail and/or postal addresses, and medical information such as symptoms, diagnoses, current medical treatments and insurance status. "Collection of such information may compromise patient privacy if made accessible to unauthorized users," the researchers noted. "An interesting feature of this marketing strategy is its potential role as a means in which Web users are coerced to provide consumer information that unwittingly drives the content of the Web sites they view. Such a new version of targeted direct-to-consumer advertising could automatically gather information from drug-offer forms, patient searches, previously visited web sites or even text from e-mail. The strategy would then provide advertising links to web pages offering discounted or free coupons for drugs."
For more information:
http://uwnews.org/article.asp?artic...
The study, recently published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, shows how Big Pharma's marketing tactics can be misleading and downright tricky. The drug company-backed web sites contain all sorts of positive hype about the drugs being pushed, including testimonials from patients who appear glowing with good health and enthusiastic words for their prescription fix. But what about risks, efficacy and side effects? Don't bother looking too close for that information.
The research team, headed by Dr. William G. Weppner of the University of Washington (UW) Department of Medicine and the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Boise, Idaho, found that hard facts -- quantitative information on the medication's indications for use, effectiveness and risks -- are rarely mentioned. The omission is so glaring that the researchers are calling for additional studies to determine if Big Pharma's free offers are actually trying to distract or divert patients from reading risk information.
What's more, the freebie drug offers may be pushing people to take medications they don't need. Patients surfing the web typically find a web site with a list of symptoms and information about a drug that will supposedly treat their health problems -- all they have to do is download and print the coupon or voucher on the web site, take it to a doctor to obtain a prescription and then give the coupon and prescription to a pharmacist. The researchers cited evidence that many physicians' decisions to prescribe specific drugs are influenced by patient requests based on direct-to-consumer advertisements and by the availability of free samples. In fact, the study found evidence that the freebie offers have a huge impact on exactly what drugs are being prescribed. Out of 50 of the most frequently prescribed medications, more than half have Internet free sample offers.
And just how "free" are the Internet offered drug samples? Not very. The study concluded that people who take the drug companies up on these deals will have to pay to keep taking the shilled brand-name medication -- and in most cases there's no low-cost generic equivalent. "Many of these discounts are aimed at co-pays, which could increase costs to consumers via health insurance premiums," Dr. Weppner said in a statement to the press.
The study calculated that the average annual retail cost for the drugs being pushed with free samples was $1,559, with a range of $84 to $5,668. The total yearly value of the free samples for these medications had an average of $86 and the total yearly value of the discounts offered by Big Pharma-sponsored web sites had a mean of $75, with a range of $5 to $300. In other words, the coupon or voucher covered only about 5 percent of the expensive yearly bill for drugs that were often only prescribed in the first place because people took the free coupon to their doctors.
And if you think these revelations about Big Pharma's questionable marketing-to-consumers-directly tactics couldn't get any worse in terms of greed or questionable ethics, there's even more to this story. The new study revealed that the pharmaceutical industry is gathering personal information on consumers with their freebie drug racket.
To obtain the free offers, 71 percent of the web sites require a host of personal information including e-mail and/or postal addresses, and medical information such as symptoms, diagnoses, current medical treatments and insurance status. "Collection of such information may compromise patient privacy if made accessible to unauthorized users," the researchers noted. "An interesting feature of this marketing strategy is its potential role as a means in which Web users are coerced to provide consumer information that unwittingly drives the content of the Web sites they view. Such a new version of targeted direct-to-consumer advertising could automatically gather information from drug-offer forms, patient searches, previously visited web sites or even text from e-mail. The strategy would then provide advertising links to web pages offering discounted or free coupons for drugs."
For more information:
http://uwnews.org/article.asp?artic...
Friday, December 4, 2009
Warning: drug ads are harmful to your health
(NaturalNews) If you watch TV or ever flip through a glossy magazine, you are bound to have seen ads conjured up by Big Pharma working with slick advertising agencies. As it turns out, what they are selling isn't necessarily health -- or the truth. They are pushing pills, even if they have to twist the facts a bit about what their drugs do, who needs them and why. Now a new study just published in the American Journal of Public Health concludes this prescription drug direct-to-consumer advertising (DTCA) carries significant risks for the public.
Currently, some members of Congress, including Rep. Henry Waxman (D-California), are calling for stricter FDA regulations of DTCA because the ads can lead to inappropriate prescribing. They also portray what may be a non-medical problem (such as over-active bladder, the latest "malady" discovered by Big Pharma) as a treatable medical illness requiring side-effect-laden medication.
For the new study, Dominick L. Frosch, Ph.D., assistant professor of medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), and colleagues reviewed the evidence pro and con for DTCA. Their conclusions? There could be some benefits to drug advertising, but they are limited. On the other hand, the researchers found the current way prescription drug ads are presented to the public carries significant risk and potential harm.
"American television viewers see as many as 16 hours of prescription drug advertisements each year, and the reality is that these ads are not doing a good job of helping consumers make better decisions about their health," Dr. Frosch said in a statement to the media. "If the pharmaceutical industry isn't willing to change the ads to make them more useful to consumers, Congress should consider passing legislation that will regulate the ads to improve the information provided in order to help patients make more informed choices."
Several drug company ads have already been changed or pulled because they were so blatantly misleading. Take the now defunct ad campaign for the statin drug Lipitor which featured Robert Jarvik, inventor of the artificial heart, for example. Wearing a white coat, Jarvik looked straight into the camera and proclaimed: "I'm glad I take Lipitor, as a doctor and as a dad." Then, in the final shot, we saw how super fit, cardiovascular-wise, this middle-aged, statin taking man was as he powerfully rowed a boat across a lake. The problem? He's not licensed as a medical doctor. And that wasn't even him rowing -- it was a muscular body double.
Another statin fiasco: the ad campaign hyping the efficacy of Vytorin seemed to blame high cholesterol not just on diet but on quirky relatives (and all anyone had to do was take a pill to resolve the problem). The Vytorin commercials were finally pulled after research emerged that Vytorin failed to show any benefit over a cheaper drug.
For more information:
http://ajph.aphapublications.org/cg...
Currently, some members of Congress, including Rep. Henry Waxman (D-California), are calling for stricter FDA regulations of DTCA because the ads can lead to inappropriate prescribing. They also portray what may be a non-medical problem (such as over-active bladder, the latest "malady" discovered by Big Pharma) as a treatable medical illness requiring side-effect-laden medication.
For the new study, Dominick L. Frosch, Ph.D., assistant professor of medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), and colleagues reviewed the evidence pro and con for DTCA. Their conclusions? There could be some benefits to drug advertising, but they are limited. On the other hand, the researchers found the current way prescription drug ads are presented to the public carries significant risk and potential harm.
Ads intentionally misinform viewers
For example, the researchers noted that the majority of ads fail to provide enough information to inform consumers about whether they actually need an advertised drug. What's more, the highly dramatized, emotional presentation of a medication's supposed benefits can also be misleading. Meanwhile, any information about risks tends to be diluted by the use of imagery that contradicts facts about side effects and warnings."American television viewers see as many as 16 hours of prescription drug advertisements each year, and the reality is that these ads are not doing a good job of helping consumers make better decisions about their health," Dr. Frosch said in a statement to the media. "If the pharmaceutical industry isn't willing to change the ads to make them more useful to consumers, Congress should consider passing legislation that will regulate the ads to improve the information provided in order to help patients make more informed choices."
Several drug company ads have already been changed or pulled because they were so blatantly misleading. Take the now defunct ad campaign for the statin drug Lipitor which featured Robert Jarvik, inventor of the artificial heart, for example. Wearing a white coat, Jarvik looked straight into the camera and proclaimed: "I'm glad I take Lipitor, as a doctor and as a dad." Then, in the final shot, we saw how super fit, cardiovascular-wise, this middle-aged, statin taking man was as he powerfully rowed a boat across a lake. The problem? He's not licensed as a medical doctor. And that wasn't even him rowing -- it was a muscular body double.
Another statin fiasco: the ad campaign hyping the efficacy of Vytorin seemed to blame high cholesterol not just on diet but on quirky relatives (and all anyone had to do was take a pill to resolve the problem). The Vytorin commercials were finally pulled after research emerged that Vytorin failed to show any benefit over a cheaper drug.
For more information:
http://ajph.aphapublications.org/cg...
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