Branding Illness

Filmmaker Anne Georget's Branding Illness takes on large pharmaceutical companies, accusing them of creating new illnesses to fit the substances they manufacture and market. A condition is invented and labeled—for example, “premenstrual dysphoric disorder” (PMDD), featuring symptoms that include severe depression, irritability, and tension prior to menstruation. The treatment for PMDD involves a drug similar in all ways but the color of the pill to Prozac, and it was introduced just about the time the patent on Prozac was set to expire (the new product costs about four times more than Prozac). The documentary also argues that many adults are being treated for hypertension, high cholesterol, or high blood sugar not because they are sick but because the thresholds for diagnosing those conditions have been adjusted downward, thus allowing wider markets for big pharma. Unlike the 1960s and before—when most pharmaceutical researchers were independent—upwards of 80 percent of clinical trials today are paid for by the corporations themselves. Drawing on the opinions of physicians, historians, and medical anthropologists, not all of the arguments here are entirely persuasive (and, not surprisingly, pharmaceutical firms contacted by the filmmaker declined to comment), but Georget certainly offers much food for thought. Recommended. Aud: C, P. (F. Gardner)