Credit score: Pixabay/CC0 Public Area
A brand new peer-reviewed research within the journal Advertising and marketing Science finds that direct-to-consumer (DTC) promoting for prescription smoking-cessation medicine meaningfully reduces cigarette use. On the similar time, the analysis discovered that promoting for over-the-counter (OTC) nicotine merchandise doesn’t scale back cigarette use.
The analysis highlights how promoting can both help or undermine public well being targets in the case of smoking cessation, relying on the kind of cessation product being promoted.
The research, “Investigating the Impact of Advertising on Smoking Cessation: The Role of Direct-to-Consumer Prescription Drug Advertising,” was authored by Erfan Loghmani of the College of Washington and Ali Goli of the College of Rochester.
The research authors examined almost a decade of U.S. market-level knowledge, combining promoting publicity with prescription information and retail gross sales of cigarettes, e-cigarettes and nicotine alternative therapies (NRTs).
They discovered that prescription advertisements do assist scale back smoking. Chantix promoting—the main prescription cessation drug—boosted prescriptions for each Chantix and Bupropion (an older prescription possibility) and led to decrease cigarette gross sales throughout markets.
On the flip aspect, advertisements for OTC smoking cessation merchandise didn’t scale back cigarette use. They shifted some people who smoke towards choices equivalent to nicotine patches, gums and lozenges and away from prescription therapies which were proven to be simpler. This sample means that OTC promoting might have unintended penalties for general cessation efforts.
There have been some spillover results. Advertisements for prescription smoking cessation merchandise spilled over to elevated demand for different cessation strategies, together with Bupropion and even e-cigarettes.
Insurance coverage protection performed a crucial position in shaping how promoting influenced conduct. In markets the place well being plans supplied robust protection for prescription cessation medicine, promoting translated into larger declines in cigarette gross sales.
In distinction, in markets with restricted protection, the identical promoting typically pushed people who smoke towards OTC merchandise and even e-cigarettes, which is perhaps much less efficient at supporting long-term cessation.
This discovering underscores that the general public well being advantages of promoting rely upon the accessibility and affordability of the promoted therapies, in addition to the supply of substitutes. The identical promoting funding yields very completely different public well being outcomes relying on these structural components.
“We find that direct-to-consumer advertising for prescription smoking-cessation drugs reduces cigarette sales, there is no question,” stated Loghmani.
“But direct-to-consumer advertising of OTC smoking-cessation products can have unintended consequences and shift some smokers away from prescription therapies that are shown to be more effective. This distinction is crucial for policymakers considering whether to restrict pharmaceutical advertising.”
The analysis workforce analyzed promoting expenditures, prescription fills, and retail gross sales for cigarettes and cessation merchandise throughout a number of U.S. markets between 2010 and 2020. Utilizing econometric fashions, they estimated each direct results (promoting on its goal product) and oblique results (spillovers to substitutes and enhances).
They then carried out simulations to check the impact of lowered DTCA promoting on cigarette gross sales. They discovered {that a} 10% discount in DTCA results in a 0.23% enhance in cigarette gross sales and an equal lower of 21.3 million packs of cigarettes in whole nicotine content material consumption.
“Our analysis shows that prescription drug advertising reduces cigarette consumption through multiple pathways,” stated Goli.
“The primary mechanism is increased prescriptions for the effective prescription cessation medications, but we also observe spillover effects to other cessation products. However, these spillovers vary in effectiveness, which is why insurance coverage matters so much—when people can access the prescription drugs, we see the strongest public health benefits.”
This outcome provides to the continued debate on how DTCA of prescribed drugs impacts public well being. Though policymaking our bodies just like the American Medical Affiliation (AMA) have advocated for a ban on all DTCA, the research exhibits that DTCA is internet constructive for smoking cessation.
Extra data:
Erfan Loghmani et al, Investigating the Affect of Promoting on Smoking Cessation: The Function of Direct-to-Client Prescription Drug Promoting, Advertising and marketing Science (2025). DOI: 10.1287/mksc.2024.0848
Supplied by
Institute for Operations Analysis and the Administration Sciences
Quotation:
Examine exhibits advertisements for prescription smoking cessation medicine assist scale back smoking charges, however OTC advertisements fall brief (2025, October 22)
retrieved 22 October 2025
from https://medicalxpress.com/information/2025-10-ads-prescription-cessation-drugs-otc.html
This doc is topic to copyright. Aside from any truthful dealing for the aim of personal research or analysis, no
half could also be reproduced with out the written permission. The content material is offered for data functions solely.
