Health

Hospitals Seek Healthy Revenues

Submitted by Diane Farsetta on

A study of newspaper ads for 17 top university medical centers found they "employ some of the same advertising techniques doctors often criticize drug companies for -- concealing risks and playing on fear, vanity and other emotions to attract patients." Of the 122 ads examined, 62% used emotional appeals and one-third "used slogans focusing on technology, fostering a misperception that high-tech medicine is always better." Twenty-one ads promoted specific services, including one proclaiming, "We do Boto

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Main Source: 
Wall Street Journal (reg. req'd.), March 28, 2005
Topics: 
Health
Marketing

McPositioning

Submitted by Bob Burton on

A new round of global television advertisements developed for McDonald’s by the Leo Burnett advertising agency, Chicago columnist Lewis Lazare writes, are "pushing too hard to position itself as a health-conscious company, a claim that comes off a bit disingenuous." Across the Pacific, New Zealand Minister for Health and former dental nurse Annette King was busy dismissing the suggestion that having Ronald McDonald’s clown fa

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Main Source: 
Chicago Sun Times, March 10, 2005
Topics: 
Health
Marketing

Must've Herd Her Wrong

Submitted by Diane Farsetta on

University of California-Davis nutritionist Lindsay Allen says reporters "hyped" her concerns, when she was quoted at the February meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science as saying, "It's unethical for parents to bring up their children as strict vegans." Allen says strict vegetarian diets are unethical, unless "missing nutrients" are added "through supplements or fortified foods." Allen's research with Kenyan children found that their development improved when their nutrient-d

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Main Source: 
California Aggie, March 2, 2005
Topics: 
Corporations
Health

The PR Plan Behind Big Tobacco's Big Victory

The tobacco industry won a big victory Friday when the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled in its favor, against the U.S. Justice Department. The court's ruling means that the Justice Department cannot force the industry to disgorge $280 billion in past profits, even if it wins its fraud and racketeering case against the cigarette makers.

Little media attention has been paid to this important decision in a landmark case concerning a major public health threat. The near-invisible nature of the ongoing federal trial to determine whether Big Tobacco engaged in a conspiracy of fraud and deceit may represent another aspect of that very conspiracy - the successful efforts of tobacco industry PR to influence journalists. Internal tobacco industry documents shed light on the largely hidden phenomena of corporate tobacco lobbyists courting favor with editorial boards.

Fight for Your Right to Advertise to Kids

Submitted by Diane Farsetta on

The "top three advertisers of packaged-foods to children," General Mills, Kellogg and Kraft Foods, along with the Grocery Manufacturers of America and several advertising associations, "have created a lobbying group to defend the right to advertise to kids." The new group, the Alliance for American Advertising, states, "There is not a correlation between advertising trends and recent childhood

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Main Source: 
Wall Street Journal, January 26, 2005
Topics: 
Corporations
Health

Goodwill Hunting

Submitted by Diane Farsetta on

In 2003, two companies in the Manchester neighborhood, Valero Refining and Lyondell-Citgo, "ranked among the top dozen in the Houston area for accidental releases of air contaminants." But "the men and women who live there rarely complain," writes the Houston Chronicle, perhaps because of the "free car washes, donated computers, elementary school essay contests and Easter egg hunts" the companies sponsor.

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Main Source: 
Houston Chronicle, January 16, 2005
Topics: 
Environment
Health

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