Wow, imagine that! You advertise a product and suddenly people feel a need for that product - pure rocket science here! Just one more slice of the dysfunctional health care system pie.
"When patients ask for a drug, they tend to get a drug regardless of whether it is appropriate for them,"
Oh dear, we can't have the peons making their own decisions about what drugs to try, now can we? Given that doctors now spend about 10 minutes with each patient, it's a safe bet that, on average, a reasonably intelligent and college educated patient has at least as good judgment as the doctor as to "whether it is appropriate for them". I mean, we're talking about anitdepressants here, not OxyContin or newer antibiotics that need to be reserved for severe antibiotic-resistant infections on public health grounds.
Doesn't the fact that they were actresses set off any alarms? They had a role that they were playing to the hilt. I'm sure the doctors may have been taken in by how depressed the women came across.
As far as advertisements go, I think people have the right to know about the newest things. I think a lot of chronically depressed people don't really realize it because they are so used to life being a shade of gray. Sometimes, these ads make you reflect.