Pfizer Viagra ad fails to inform consumers of drug safety risks, says FDA

• Pharmaceutical companies love to tout their drug ads as examples of consumer education.
• But that argument hardly stands up in Pfizer's (PFE) latest Viagra pitches.
• The Food & Drug Administration recently sent the outfit a warning letter saying its racy consumer ads for the male impotence drug don't contain enough information about risks and side effects.
• Pfizer agreed on Nov. 15 to pull the ads after the letter was made public.
• The FDA allows drugmakers to advertise their drugs without the side-effects summary if they don't mention the medical condition at all.
• "It's the most blatantly out-of-control ad I've seen," charges Janell Mayo Duncan, legislative and regulatory counsel at Consumers Union, the nonprofit publisher of Consumer Reports.
• Pfizer isn't alone in getting warned, and it's not the first time for the outfit, either.
• In recent years, the FDA has warned the makers of Vioxx and Celebrex, Merck (MRK) and Pfizer, respectively, about advertising their drugs in a too-positive light without explaining possible side effects.
• This latest warning, however, highlights broader problems in the way direct-to-consumer pitches are governed.
• "The agency simply doesn't have enough staff," says Michael Montagne, professor of social pharmacy at the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences.
• An FDA warning to the world's largest drugmaker for misrepresenting a blockbuster medication (Viagra sales topped $1 billion in 2003) isn't likely to teach the industry any lessons.
• "No publicity is bad publicity in this context," says Gibbons.