Neuropathy- not sexy enough!

It's a well-known fact that drug companies are constantly searching for celebrities to either promote a drug, or a disease, or both. In this respect, neuropathy just ain't sexy! I've searched the internet in vain, for lists of neuropathy sufferers amongst the rich and famous - they must be there but if so they're not publicising the fact and then imagine how difficult it will be to find an HIV+ role model with neuropathy! The point is, it can make a great deal of financial difference, as this article by Geoffrey Cowley and Karen Springen in Newsweek explains. So come on famous neuropathy sufferers...out yourselves! We need your drug company's investment!

Trivia :This subject was actually the material used in an English exam for Dutch students in 2007

The bad news is there is no cure available because no celebrities have your disease!

CELEBRITY PITCH

Unless you suffer from peripheral neuropathy, chances are you’ve never heard of it. PN is a condition in which damaged nerves cause debilitating pain and numbness in the extremities. It affects as many as 20 million people in the United States alone, including nearly 10 percent of all Medicare patients. So why don’t we hear more about it? What does a condition like ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease) have that PN doesn’t? Well, Lou Gehrig, for one thing. Stephen Hawking, for another.

When Ben Stiller hosts a gala for Project ALS, people like George Clooney, Matthew Broderick and Sarah Jessica Parker show up. The Neuropathy Association has yet to snag even a soap-opera star. “Johnny Cash, who suffered from it, actually said he would do a spot for us once he got better,” says Dr. Norman Latov, the association’s medical director. “But he died.”

For better or worse, star power is transforming health and medicine. Movie actors now dominate congressional hearings on research policy, and drug companies compete to link famous names to lucrative afflictions. Bob Dole has been trotted out to discuss his erectile difficulties; Debbie Reynolds, her urinary incontinence; American football icon Terry Bradshaw, his struggle with depression; Lance Armstrong, his triumph over testicular cancer. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Celebrities can raise awareness, shatter stigmas and promote healthy behaviour. But when their confessions are prompted by seven-figure contracts and orchestrated by corporate marketers, some scepticism is indicated. In certain cases, says University of Pennsylvania bioethicist Arthur Caplan, the celebrity pitch is “just a fancy form of prostitution.”
No one would have said that a decade ago. Drug companies didn’t need sitcom stars back in 1991, says Dr. Leon Rosenberg, a former chief scientific officer for Bristol-Myers Squibb. “If you got a drug approved, you depended on physicians to improve sales and market share.” But physicians no longer hold all the cards.

With the rise of health activism in the 1990s, and the growth of the Internet, patients gained far more say in their own treatment. They’re now consumers of care, not passive recipients – and the medical industry has strong incentives to reach out to them. That’s why celebrity testimonials “have become a big business,” says Barry Greenberg of Celebrity Connection, a Los Angeles celebrity brokerage that matches stars with sponsors according to their medical conditions. “I wouldn’t want to be the pharmaceutical guy who stands up at a meeting and says, ‘You know what? The companies to the left and the right of us are all using celebrities, but I think we’ll pass’.” Unlike ads for cars or dog food, celebrity drug promotions are presented as awareness campaigns.

“Talk to your doctor,” goes the refrain. “This condition is treatable.” The pitchman may stick to that message (enough said if there’s only one treatment), but the sponsor often gets a special nod. “My treatment included three drugs made by Bristol-Myers Squibb, the world’s leader in cancer research and development,” Lance Armstrong says in publicity material for his recent “Tour of Hope.” The tour was billed as an effort to “inspire and inform the public about the importance of participating in cancer research.” It also netted Armstrong more than $2 million from Bristol- Myers Squibb, according to news reports. (Neither the company nor Armstrong’s agent would discuss his fee when we approached them about this.)

Stars like Christopher Reeve and Michael J. Fox have won praise for educating policymakers about particular afflictions. But when funds are finite, a campaign that boosts support for one disease reduces it for another. Suppose Julia Roberts persuades Congress to fund more research on Rett syndrome (a rare condition she spoke out for in 2002).

“Certainly there’s research to be done,” says Dr. Gilbert Ross of the American Council on Science and Health. “But is the money going to be diverted from tobacco education? Is it going to be diverted from diabetes research?” If so, the net effect on public health would probably be negative. As medicine sheds its paternalism, celebrities may gain even greater stature as health advisers. For the rest of us, the challenge is not to take them too seriously.

Geoffrey Cowley and Karen Springen: Newsweek