Emergency Contraceptive Pills , are they being marketed too well???

The topic which I will touch upon today is something which marketers would generally avoid discussing .... the ethical angle in marketing. We one could also call it the dark side of marketing .....

Marketing is very powerful and quoting what was told to spiderman "With great power comes great responsibility" :)

We marketers should also be fully aware of the responsibility which comes along with yielding such a powerful force on consumers. The case in point is the aggressive promotion of emergency contraceptive pills which is happening in the country currently.

The fact that they have been made into OTC (over the counter) drugs by which it means that they can be sold without a doctor's prescription and companies can directly communicate to consumers is one which has lead to the issue. The two companies , ipill of Cipla and unwanted-72 by Mankind Pharama ltd are promoting their brands through aggressive ads which can be seen on many TV channels during peak hours and this has lead to....

..a spike in the sale of these pills in many cities across the country, like this report from Lucknow says that there has been a 40% spike in the sales of these pills over the last six months and the increased usage has been seen in the 16-35 age group, report.

There has been a lot of media reports on the side-effects that these pills and how this promotion is increasing the rampant use of the product. This report in Indian express shares the increased and indiscriminate use of these pills by teenagers , report.

There has been public discontent about the content and frequency of these ads too, like this report in times of India tells us, report.

The negative fall-out of this sort of all out ad-campaign would be an indiscriminate use of these pills (seen as a substitute for other means of preventing pregnancy), leading to two other problems, one this could lead to reduced usage of condoms by their partners, increasing the chances of transmission of HIV and other sexually transmitted disease and the second more complex problem would be the one linked to the continuous usage of these pills leading to long term problems with women in terms disturbed menstrual cycles and problems in conceiving. Though many of the side-effects are mentioned along with the product but .............

Just to reinforce my point , I will quote directly from Marketing Guru Seth Godin's Blog post "Is Marketing Evil?"

"Marketing is beautiful when it persuades people to get a polio vaccine or wash their hands before doing surgery. Marketing is powerful when it sells a product to someone who discovers more joy or more productivity because he bought it.....

Marketing has more reach, with more speed, than it has ever had before. With less money, you can have more impact than anyone could have imagined just ten years ago. The question, one I hope you'll ask yourself, is what are you going to do with that impact?

........Just because you can market something doesn't mean you should."

This debate can be extended to the sale of many products like cigarettes, liquor, fairness creams and cola drinks. But maybe somewhere we should be able to a line ???? Not sure if many of you would agree with this line of thought..............