Program

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A Provocative Symposium on the Selling of Sickness

The ascendancy of market logic has both expanded and legitimised the commercialisation of medicine. In the pharmaceutical sector, competitive enterprise dominates not only the development of drugs -and increasingly their diffusion - but also the very definitions of the illnesses they are used to treat.

Industry capacity for innovation, essential for sustaining high profitability, has arguably extended beyond the invention of novel products to the creation of new illnesses, disorders and dysfunction, and the expansion of old ones. Using informal alliances with physician and patient groups, and with the assistance of public relations experts, drug companies now 'brand' conditions just as they brand medicines.

Contentiously characterised as 'disease-mongering' by the late Lynn Payer many marketing strategies appear to be about selling sickness in order to sell drugs. Examples of disorders that have been represented in this way are as diverse as male and female erectile dysfunction, social anxiety disorder, alopecia, and irritable bowl. No-one questions that some individuals suffering from these 'conditions' experience genuine morbidity. The 'disorders' are also difficult to define and quantify, tend to be chronic and in some cases seem to represent normal human variation or the predictable but undesired effects of ageing.

In the lead up to this global symposium we are commissioning a series of thoughtful academic and accessible discussion papers that will assay the role of marketing in contemporary medical practice, and attempt to understand and challenge the phenomenon of disease-mongering.

The conference will be organized around a mixture of plenary, parallel and small group sessions. The aims of the conference are to review a range of examples of disease-mongering, to develop a common view on the character and magnitude of the problems created by disease-mongering, to develop some position statements and a research agenda that will lead to collaborative projects.

Themes

1. A taxonomy of disease-mongering; understanding through classification
2. A contemporary case study: the selling of bi-polar disorder
3. Nothing new under the sun- a historical perspective on the selling of sickness- from medicalisation to disease-mongering
4. The psychology of disease-mongering- do disease-awareness campaigns make some people sick?
5. The role of health professionals - is this about power or money?
6. The role of patient groups- genuine advocacy or corporate allies?
7. The role of the spin industry- exposing and confronting the silent mind-changers in global PR
8. The role of the media - what role does media play in disease-mongering, and how might that change?
9. The role of government - how might disease-mongering be regulated?
10. Independent disease-definition strategies- what are the alternatives to the current model of entangled panels constantly expanding disease definitions?

Invited Speakers

• Joe Collier (UK)
• Joel Lexchin (Canada)
• David Healy (UK)
• Steve Woloshin (USA)
• Lisa Schwartz (USA)
• Leonore Tiefer (USA)
• Barbara Mintzes (Canada)
• Iona Heath (UK)
• Ray Moynihan (Australia)
• Ian Kerridge (Australia)
• David Henry (Australia)