The U.K. is the European country most affected by the Swine Flu virus. Media coverage in the U.K. has been extensive and subsequent consumer reaction is benefiting sales of related products. Notably, sales of digital thermometers have grown by 57% year on year as people are encouraged to stay at home and “self diagnose” to avoid the spread of the virus. As the Guardian recently reported, many shops have sold out of items such as thermometers. Basic hygiene is being promoted by the government and businesses as one …

TV viewers seem more immune to pitches for allergy medications this spring when compared to the year before, according to a new study from Nielsen IAG. Overall, recall among allergy sufferers aged 25-54 for all the ads on air from January through May this year was 10 points lower than during the same period a year ago.
That’s not to say every ad in the category was unmemorable. An ad for Claritin featuring Nascar’s Carl Edwards was judged slightly more memorable than last year’s top ad for the category featuring the …

Alex Burmaster
Last month, we were honored to win a ‘BOBI’ award for “Most Innovative Approach” from the British Healthcare Business Intelligence Association for our recent work with Pfizer. Their challenge was to monitor what consumers were saying online about Champix, the company’s smoking cessation aid, and to that end, we created a research methodology using our BuzzMetrics solutions.
Whilst winning is, of course, fantastic, what was most important for us was that the client was so happy with the work that they submitted us for the award in the first place.
What’s …

Now more than ever, marketers are trying to identify and reach profitable and discrete market segments that were previously overlooked in an effort to keep growing in difficult economic conditions.  Predictive analytics is one way to do that: it marries a range of consumer, transaction and media information and reveals the “who” and “how” of an effective go-to-market strategy.
Predictive analytics can help marketers in several ways:  It can provide a deeper understanding of customers to guide the marketing spend; it offers guidance on selecting messages and vehicles for communicating with …

Almost half of consumers around the world say that the recession is changing how they buy non-prescription medications. Some (12%) say that they will use less of them, while others are switching to natural and traditional remedies.  According to a major new study from Nielsen, how consumers self-medicate and choose non-prescription medications varies widely by region.  For example, more than half of Europeans tend to look to their pharmacist for advice on which products to use, while only 13 percent of Americans do the same.
Most consumers said that they would …

Melissa Davies
The Pew Internet & American Life Project today released the results of its latest survey into how and when Americans use the Internet to gather health information. In The Social Life of Health Information, Pew reports that Americans are turning to an increasingly broader array of online and offline resources in their search for health information.
Highlights from the report include:

83 percent of online adults have looked on the Web for health information. (Since 2002, Pew Internet Project surveys have consistently found that 75-83 percent of Internet users look online …

Nearly half of consumers around the world will change their usage of non-prescription medicines because of the recession. Consumers are making less frequent purchases, using more natural and traditional remedies and buying cheaper products.

Melissa Davies
The FDA announced yesterday that it is launching a Transparency Task Force, charged with “making useful and understandable information about FDA activities and decision-making more readily available to the public in a timely manner and in a user-friendly format.” The task force will seek public input on how the FDA can be more transparent, including identifying “new technologies for informing the public.” To this end, there will be a public meeting on June 24, 2009, to solicit recommendations.

As previously reported, sales of over-the-counter smoking cessation products such as nicotine gum, lozenges and patches have increased as new federal and state taxes have boosted the price of a pack of cigarettes to $10 or more.  And the trend detected in the weeks immediately following the tax increases has not abated: in the most recent four week period ended May 16th, dollar sales of the aids were up 18.9 percent over the same period in 2008, while on an equivalized unit volume basis sales were up 30.1 percent (and up …

Web sites like Drugstore.com have been on the scene in the U.S. for several years now. But Germans have now taken to the convenience of ordering over-the-counter (OTC) medications over the Internet. According to Nielsen new MailTrack Pharma service, nearly 48 million OTC packs were sold through mail-order pharmacies in 2008 in Germany, accounting for 5.2 percent of total sales volume. On a value basis, share is even higher, with 7.3 percent or €521 million in sales.
“These numbers confirm the acceptance and attractiveness of mail order. Indeed, one in two …