We call this free speech
Correspondents have raised a number of issues related to The Journal's advertising policy following our decision to include copies of a document supported by AstraZeneca in the same wrapper as the issue of 20 January. These
correspondents (pp129–131) have prompted us to publish our policy for advertisers. It will be posted online in the next few weeks and we hope it will clarify some of the issues and preconceptions raised.
In the meantime, we would like to point out that the document was neither
an advertisement nor an advertorial. (If it were the former it would
have to carry prescribing information; if the latter it would have appeared
in the pages of The Journal and would have been labelled an “advertisement
feature”.) Neither was it a supplement to The Journal, since it
was not branded, or endorsed, either by us or by the Royal Pharmaceutical
Society.
So what was it? As far as The Journal is concerned it was a discussion
document written by two health professionals (a well known GP and a well
known pharmacist), inviting readers to consider how National Institute
for Health and Clinical Excellence guidance might be implemented. It
was not masquerading as NICE guidance, as one correspondent put it. Some
comments made by others about the authors’ integrity were too libellous
for us to publish.
What seems to have offended the correspondents is that the document drew
conclusions that were counter to NICE guidance (although this is not
a new phenomenon — the BNF publishes guidance that is counter to
what NICE advises). Worse than that, they say it was a marketing device
that might influence pharmacists who came across it. The Journal is not
prepared to take such a patronising line: pharmacists can assess the
validity of the document’s content for themselves.
Who are we to prevent the distribution of a document (which is neither
illegal nor indecent, and which does not break any industrial or regulatory
codes of practice as far as we are aware) that has been written by practising
health professionals with reputations that, presumably, they would not
want to squander on an argument that they did not believe was worth airing?
We are inclined to call this free speech.
We put this sort of document in the same category as MeReC bulletins
and other such independent publications for which we charge an insert
fee and which are carried in the same wrapper as The Journal. Pharmacists
may not like the subject matter of inserts (into which we have no editorial
input) or the way it is presented but it is up to readers to accept or
reject the material; it is not up to us to prevent them from seeing it.
Back to Top
|
The
Pharmaceutical Journal