Popularize medical knowledge and resist false advertisement

The absence of Science Popularization "nourishes" the restriction of science popularization space and effect by false advertising funds "No matter in brochure, promotion activities, newspaper, radio, television, network, mobile phone, we can see the figure of false medicine advertisement Why do fake medicine advertisements spread everywhere? Why are consumers, especially middle-aged and elderly consumers, repeatedly fooled? " In response to the above problems, Lu Tianqi, director of Huairou branch of Beijing food and drug administration, believes that "to crack down on false medical advertisements, we cannot rely solely on administrative means It is important to cultivate mature consumer groups and let consumers consciously stay away from false advertisements." The absence of popular science "nourishes" false advertisements "As an ordinary consumer, I have no professional knowledge What do I look at when I buy medicine without looking at advertisements?" Mr Chen, the consumer, narrated his purchase process: when watching the advertisement, first see whether the product's indications are in line with his own symptoms; then see whether the efficacy of the product is cured; then see whether the product is the latest research results As for price, it's not a consideration The use of medical products requires a certain degree of professional knowledge Consumers who lack medical knowledge are easily affected by false medical advertisements "The lack of public medical knowledge makes illegal medical advertisements have the soil to survive." A staff member of Chongqing food and Drug Administration told reporters that the case of "Huo Xianqing" recently investigated by Chongqing food and drug administration is very representative A product called "Huo's fresh clean" is widely touted as a cure for psoriasis, and many patients have to buy it after watching the advertisement But after the patient uses not only did not see the curative effect, on the contrary aggravated the condition According to the investigation, "Huo's fresh Qing" has no Chinese medicine batch number and has no therapeutic effect on diseases From 2009 to 2012, "Huo Xianqing" has been investigated and punished by the industry and commerce, food and Drug Administration and other departments in Shanxi, Hebei, Chongqing and other provinces and cities for many times The illegal reasons are "non drugs involve drug publicity and seriously deceive consumers" Some provinces and cities have also imposed a permanent ban on its sale "The lack of consumer medical knowledge does not mean that pharmaceutical companies can ignore consumers' right to know and exaggerate the product effect at will to tempt consumers." According to the head of China Pharmaceutical Press Association, a responsible pharmaceutical enterprise should adopt appropriate methods, carry out consumer related consumption education, and guide consumers to use drugs scientifically and reasonably According to the survey, most of the false medicine advertisements focus on anti rheumatism, asthma, skin disease, diabetes series drugs They mainly use the psychology of the patients with chronic diseases who are eager to seek medical care, through the false efficacy publicity, to lure the patients to buy products, especially the middle-aged and elderly groups "At present, there are more than 130 million people over 60 years old in China, but most of them lack health care knowledge due to their low level of education." "It is imperative to carry out the popularization of medical and health care knowledge for the elderly in various forms and enhance the awareness of self-care and self-protection of the elderly," said Xu Qin, China Center for popular science and Research on aging Funds restrict the space and effect of science popularization "For many years, the country has been carrying out the rectification of false medicine advertisements, but the effect is very small Therefore, at the same time, we should pay more attention to the root cause " Lu Tianqi said that the so-called "root treatment" means that the regulatory authorities should adhere to the concept of "cultivating mature consumer groups is the best supervision of the market", actively carry out science popularization education of medicine, widely spread knowledge of safe drug use by expanding the audience coverage, and let consumers consciously stay away from fake medicine advertisements According to Lu Tianqi, Huairou District of Beijing has more mountains and less land, with scattered residents Like residents all over the country, the information of residents' self medication basically comes from medical advertisements Under the influence of false medical advertisements, people are often cheated or even cause physical injury After the establishment of Huairou branch, in view of these problems, the supervisors compiled the popular science book of "100 questions about common sense of medicine" through careful screening, and on this basis, invested 1 million yuan to produce a series of 50 episode sitcoms of "safe medicine, healthy life", to publicize the knowledge of popular medicine in a simple way Through the forms of TV stations, Internet and movies, 38000 people were educated in science popularization At present, Huairou District residents' awareness of safe drug use is generally enhanced, and the phenomenon of watching advertisements to buy drugs is greatly reduced "However, Huairou model can not be copied all over the country." A staff member of the food and Drug Administration of Luzhou City, Sichuan Province, explained: at present, the food and drug supervision funds in the central and western regions and other economically backward areas can only guarantee the daily law enforcement supervision basically, and the "publicity funds" can not be included in the fund application at all "Local governments are more willing to invest in visible and tangible achievements projects than in scientific popularization of safe drugs." A staff member of a local food and Drug Administration in Anhui Province said that in terms of people's health and livelihood, local governments are more willing to invest heavily in the construction of "beautiful hospitals" and "testing centers", while the market supervision of false drug advertisements tends to be "sports type" rectification, "through such vigorous methods as banning, sealing up and off the shelves to display the rectification results." At present, in small and medium-sized cities, especially in county-level areas, the main way for farmers to get information is through local TV stations, the staff said "And local TV stations rely on advertising revenue to develop Even if we have medical knowledge and popular science propaganda films, TV stations will not broadcast them without paying for their advertising fees." "Even if we give money, we are worried about our jobs." The head of the advertising department of a county TV station in Hubei said bluntly, "pharmaceutical advertising is our 'food and clothing parents' and we will not do what we gain or lose." According to the data, there are still some local food and drug regulatory departments in the country in the situation of "no office space, less law enforcement equipment, and lack of office funds" "The cost of printing safe drug use posters is a patchwork of things, trying to make it happen I don't dare to pay to use the media to popularize medical knowledge." Hebei County food and drug administration staff helplessly said After the dawn of hope on how to cultivate mature pharmaceutical consumers, relevant national departments are also exploring On September 1, 2011, "national drug safety month" was launched in Beijing Focusing on the theme of "Beware of network fraud and sale of fake drugs", food and drug regulatory departments at all levels carried out various forms of popular science publicity activities on safe drug use According to the national food and drug safety science popularization action plan issued by the State Food and drug administration, during the 12th Five Year Plan period, every September will carry out the "national drug safety month" activity to popularize drug safety knowledge It is understood that during the "national drug safety month" activity every year, the food and drug regulatory departments of all regions organize medical and pharmaceutical professionals to enter communities, schools, military camps, factories and mines to provide consultation services for the public on safe drug use through public service advertisements on bus stops and TV stations "To some extent, this has improved the public's awareness of safe drug use, but it is still far from the goal of mature market consumer groups." The person in charge of Guangzhou food and Drug Administration said that at present, the biggest dilemma for local food and drug administration to carry out science popularization propaganda is that there are no good science popularization works "On the one hand, the false drug advertisements are publicized wantonly with the help of absolute language and new technological concepts; on the other hand, we lack popular and scientific means to solve the real face of the false advertisements." According to the survey results of citizens' scientific literacy published by China Association for science and technology in November 2010, the proportion of citizens with basic scientific literacy in China is only 3.27%, 20 years behind Japan, Canada, EU and other countries and regions At the same time, China's popular science books are even more worrisome The number of published books only accounts for 0.45% of the total number of books First-class scientists disdain to create popular science works Local popular science works are few in quality and poor in Ideological and readability In the aspect of medical science popularization, the quality and quantity of science popularization works are more worrying Domestic medical and pharmaceutical experts are keen on paper research and achievement publication, and they are not disdained for medical science popularization works Even if there are occasional works of this kind, due to the author's lack of necessary writing skills for popular science, the ideological and readability is not strong What's more terrible is the spread of pseudo science popularization, such as "eat the disease back" and other pseudo science popularization books have become popular for a period of time "Attracting excellent medical and pharmaceutical experts to join the writing team of medical science popularization is the direction that the regulatory authorities should strive for." The head of China Pharmaceutical Press Association said that over the years, the association has been cooperating with regulatory authorities, well-known enterprises and media reporters to promote the popularization of medicine and promote the popularization of medicine through the selection of "national food and drug good news" The government has paid more and more attention to the science popularization of medicine According to the news from the State Food and drug administration, in the new internal organization, the "news and publicity department" specially establishes a comprehensive department for science popularization, which is responsible for the publicity of science popularization knowledge of food and drugs in the whole country Through playing the guiding role of "leader", it carries out the science popularization publicity of the whole country and improves the science popularization quality of national medicine as a whole "As long as the mature consumer groups in the pharmaceutical market are cultivated successfully, is there any living space for false pharmaceutical advertisements?" A grass-roots regulator is confident.