PRODUCTWATCH
HOW SAFE ARE ANTI- OSTEOPOROSIS BONE DRUGS ?
In the case of some osteoporosis drugs , it seems to be a case of marketing over medicine
By Martha Rosenberg
Anti-osteoporosis bone drugs such as Fosamax , Boniva , and Prolia have become a billion-dollar market for drugmakers thanks to aggressive marketing .
To sell its “ bisphosphonate ” bone drug Fosamax , Merck began marketing the dangers of osteoporosis in hopes of reaching a market ” far beyond ailing old ladies ,” according to Fortune magazine . It hired an operative to create the “ Bone Measurement Institute ” to establish the “ risk of osteoporosis ” as a health epidemic and plant bone scan machines in medical offices across the country — a gambit that made Merck $ 280 million from Fosamax ’ s first-year sales . Merck ’ s
“ Bone Measurement Institute ” then lobbied , with Merckfunded groups , to get Medicare to cover bone scans through the Bone Mass Measurement Act .
Moreover , the now widely accepted condition of “ osteopenia — the risk of getting osteoporosis — was flatly invented out of thin air , according to a professor of medicine who was present when the term was concocted . It was meant to indicate someone just below the threshold for an osteoporosis diagnosis , and even that bone density was somewhat arbitrary according to the experts who helped draft it .