“Colon Blow should not be given to children under six, and should not be given to children under 18.”
They could have skipped the first clause and just said “…not be given to children under 18” and been done with it. It’s like saying, “You should not visit Indiana, and you should not visit anywhere east of the Mississippi.”
Is there a reason this commercial effectively says the same thing twice?
Any reason why you obscured the real name of the product? Hard to comment or research if we don’t know specifically what product. I, for one, have never heard this.
Sounds to me like there are kinds of warnings and they are covering their behinds by including them both. Still seems odd.
I slight thread derail, but a form I have to fill out every time a show up to work asks, “In the past 14 days, have you traveled outside the state or country?”.
Was there any special condition for the under-18 group? Something like “Do not give to children under 6, and do not give to children under 18 who have asthma”? Cuz otherwise, yeah that doesn’t make a lot of sense.
(Reading the thread title, I thought for sure this was going to be about the menopause drug that says “do not take this if you are pregnant or planning to become pregnant.”)
Did it also say “don’t take Colon Blow if you’re allergic to Colon Blow”? That’s the dumbest disclaimer yet.
I have seen the same ad or a similar ad as described in the OP. There was no distinction between the under-6 restriction and the under-18 restriction. I too was perplexed. I tried to parse it but soon decided it didn’t really make sense. Maybe there are different reasons for the under-6 restriction and the under-18 restriction. Maybe Colon Blow kills children under the age of 6 by stopping their hearts and it kills children 6 to 18 by stopping their lungs. But without knowing that context it still doesn’t make any sense,
Be sure to tell your doctor that you are taking Colon Blow.
All I know is that these are two separate categories. Medicines approved for people under 18 may not be approved for children under 6.
It’s very possible this is a regulation thing where each group has a requirement to give such a warning. Do note that this is why these disclaimers are there: they are required by law. They’d rather not have to give you all of this information when advertising their product.
In the ones I have seen, there is slightly different wording, something like “Must not be taken by children under six; do not give to people under 18” – those are not the exact words, but the difference is similarly slight and easy to miss. It seemed to me that the stricture against use by small children was a little stronger than the other one. But without the exact words it’s hard to be sure. I, too, can’t remember which of the myriad medicines being advertised that can, incidentally, kill you, this was.
For those who asked, the specific medicine was Linzess, but I’ve heard similarly-worded disclaimers for other medicines.
Very, very close to answer here. When reading warnings on drug site, the warnings are there for both, but the rationale warns about slightly different adverse potential effects for each age group.
It has to do with how the drug has been tested in trials.
There have been no trials in children under six, so the effects are unknown, or there have been, and the effects were highly unfortunate. It’s an X category drug for this age group (not a real medical term).
In people 6 to 18, there have been trials, and the drug has found either not to be effective, or to have unpredictable effects-- sometimes paradoxical effects, for instance.
So it should not be given to either age group, but if you want to look up the specifics, you will find different trials. Don’t look up the trial of one group, and think you are done-- there is another trial out there you need to read as well to have all the information.
Oversimplified, but that’s basically it.
And yes, I once attended a seminar on this stuff, because I worked for an agency that did home services for disabled people, and we handled lots and lots of drugs. We were told how to read the Physician’s Desk Reference, and it will state things like this “Do not prescribe for under age 6” followed by cites of studies, then “Ineffective in children under 12” followed by more cites. But sometimes the studies said the exact same thing-- they were just for different age groups. When you think about it, it makes sense. You do a study on children 3-12, and see it’s overall ineffective, but you want to tease out the details, so you do another set, subdividing the children by age.
You can’t tell people too many times not to behave stupidly with drugs and children. I have a very sad story reflecting this.
The commercial disclaimer is very different from the warnings on the product website:
I prefer Loostners Castor Oil Flakes, anyway, myself.
ive heard the same disclaimer on various anti depression medication ads too
Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball.
In a time when people are drinking bleach, clearly the warnings need to doubled up
Actually, “category X” is a real medical term. It’s a classification for drugs that have no known indication for use during pregnancy, and sometimes breastfeeding as well.
I have heard that “do not give to children under 18/do not give to children under 6” ad several times, and the reason is indeed that its efficacy in teenagers and older children, as compared to drugs known to be approved for that age group, is not known and that it should not be given to them unless nothing else has worked, and that there is NO reason for a child under 6 to use it.
I can’t get over the ads for drugs for end-stage cancer that say “Do not use this if you are pregnant or planning to become pregnant.” They still have to say that, because doctors who have been in practice long enough have indeed seen women who were trying to get pregnant, or succeeded, despite being terminally ill.
(Never mind that direct-to-consumer prescription drug advertising is only legal in the U.S. and New Zealand, and is terribly unethical.)
Drug reps are prohibited from doing that though (not sure if it’s law or company policies). In my line of work I talk with a lot of drug reps. To the point that I know many of them quite well, sometimes outside of work even. Due to that, I have a huge resource I can tap when I have a question. They’re typically my go to when I’m looking for a specialist doctor.
In any case, I was chit chatting with one about migraines. She reps for a migraine med and I asked her about it. She was somewhat uncomfortable talking to me about it because she’s concerned about talking directly to a consumer. Granted, I think those rules are in place to make sure they’re not hitting up waiting rooms and hospital lobbies moreso than answering questions when someone you’ve known for years asks you about it. But it was still amusing.