Bay Area Reporter - May 4, 2001
David Fraser

Facing heavy public pressure, especially from Bay Area AIDS activists, the Food and Drug Administration has told HIV drug manufacturers to pull their overly upbeat advertisements.

The FDA called the ads "misleading," noting that they ignored the many painful side effects and presented an unrealistic view of life with HIV/AIDS.

In a letter to major HIV drug manufacturers, the FDA ordered them to remove the controversial outdoor advertisements within 90 days.

The activist organization Survive AIDS had been one of the leaders in the campaign against the ads, which depict apparently healthy-looking men climbing mountains or posing suggestively, with text that places a positive spin on being HIV-positive.

In a letter to major manufacturers of HIV/AIDS drugs, the head of the FDA's Drug Marketing, Advertising, and Communications division said many of the ads "do not adequately convey that these drugs neither cure HIV infection nor reduce its transmission."

The letter said current ads promote the drugs but do not reveal their limitations, presenting instead a "misleading" picture of the HIV virus and the drugs' effect on it and people's lives.

The FDA ordered that new advertisements include information about both HIV and its transmission risks.

"This is definitely a victory for PWAs," said Survive AIDS project leader Jeff Getty. "We are certain that the drug companies will have to rethink their ad campaigns and allow community input.

"We have worked long and hard on the drug ad issue and are pleased to have this good news."

A key pressure point in the campaign against buff and/or symptom-free depictions of HIV-positive persons came with a hearing on outdoor advertising in San Francisco, held by Board of Supervisors President Tom Ammiano on April 12.

"Fabulous!" an elated Ammiano said Tuesday, May 1, in a phone interview. "It's really gratifying and we owe a great debt to the activists à they focused on the issue and pushed it and with this victory, life feels really great."

Along with many others, including specialist Dr. Jeff Klausner from the Department of Public Health, Getty made an impassioned presentation at the hearing, charging that the pharmaceutical firms were "selling the disease with drugs."

In actuality, he said, when taking powerful drugs for HIV/AIDS, "you get to the point where you're not out climbing mountains, you're not out sailing."

Some ads, Getty said, "are telling children, 'I'm positive, but with the drugs I'm going to feel more like myself again.' The pharmaceutical firms are selling the disease with drugs."

Other key testimony at the hearing came from members of the Stop AIDS Project. Communications director James Nguyen told the Bay Area Reporter: "It would have been nice for the industry to self-regulate, but the FDA's recent decision does set a tone for a serious look at the HIV epidemic on a national level. This effort by Stop AIDS volunteers and many other AIDS activists underscores how communities can come together and enact change."

Stop AIDS Project board members read a letter to the supervisors at last month's hearing saying in part, "We also hear from men, both HIV-positive and -negative, who put it much simpler with statements such as 'Climbing mountains, my ass! Where's the Porta-Potty?'"

The letter from the FDA noted that, "Although today's treatment regimens have transformed HIV infection to a chronic disease in many patients, HIV infection is still associated with significant illness and death."

Survive AIDS' campaign included conference calls with FDA officials and visuals aimed at government workers and the media.

"We had to get these ads and blow them up and display them in the halls of government in order to get our message across," said group member Michael Lauro.
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