Dear Visitor

We are a group of citizens, healthcare providers, scientists, public policy makers, legislators, scientists, and health care consumers who are concerned about direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising for genetic testing. As more genetic tests become available, it is critical that DTC advertising is subject to federal oversight (as is advertising for medications) to ensure that these ads are not misleading, inaccurate, using scare tactics, or encouraging patients to contact the very company that is profiting from each test sale. Please see the bullet points below with references for more information on DTC advertising.
 

You Can Help!

Stop this advertising until such oversight is in place!
Please:

  • Sign this on-line petition;
  • Pass it on to your friends and family;
  • Pass it on to colleagues in health care, science, public policy and public health;
  • Research which legislators in your state are interested in Consumer Protection and contact them by phone, e-mail, and fax to let them know that you want federal oversight of all DTC advertising for genetic testing before it comes to your area. (Click here to email this petition to others)
 
Article Two PDF Print E-mail

Williams-Jones B. 'Be ready against cancer, now': direct-to-consumer advertising for genetic testing.
New Genetics and Society 2006; 25(1):89-107

 

A recent addition to the debate about the benefits and harms of direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising of medicines and pharmaceuticals is a growing critique of DTC marketing and sale of genetic tests. Academic and policy literatures exploring this issue have, however, tended to focus on the sale of genetic tests, paying rather less attention to the particular implications of advertising. The globalization of broadcast media and ever increasing access to the Internet mean that public exposure to advertising for medical technologies is a reality that national regulatory bodies will be hard pressed to constrain. Working through a case study detailing Myriad Genetics' 2002 pilot advertising campaign for their BRACAnalysis genetic susceptibility test for hereditary breast and ovarian cancer, this paper highlights some of the diverse and often overlooked and unregulated approaches to DTC advertising, and the associated social, ethical and policy implications.

 

PMID: 17312631 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

 

 
 
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