The Spectator., 1914-11-10
DEFENDS POPULAR REMEDIES
Speaker Says Newspapers Should h. vestigate Merits of Medicines Be-
 fore Barring Advertisements.

That an organized attempt has been made to blacken the reputation of the popular family remedies of this coun- try, and to mislead the newspaper publishers into rejecting the adver- Using of such medicines, was the charge made by Carl J. Balliett, of Buffalo, N. Y.. at the convention of the Advertising Affiliation at Detroit
 MT. Balliett is a director of the Pro- prietary Association of America, which includes in it's membership two hun dred firms which make the popular prepared medicines of America.
 MT. Balliett pointed out that 1t Is the duty of the newspaper publisher to refuse the advertising of any fake or fraudulent medicine. just as it is his duty to refuse any fake or fraudu- lent advertising, but it is not right to shut down on all medical advertising because there have been some fakers, any more than it would be right to refuse to publish all department store advertising because certain stores have made practice of lying about bargain sales.
 Disease and death are mysteries People who are perfectly we'll are skeptical. They laugh at the time worn patent medicine joke, just as they laugh again and again over the many variations of the operation joke The operation was success but the patient died" This so-called hu- nor has perhaps hurt the medicine business with well people, but when the hitherto healthy man feels se- were pain or illness, he immediately wants medicine, and will bless the cure whether it be at the hands of a regular doctor, homeopath, an osteo- path, Christian Scientist or patent medicine. There is nothing more deadly than disease; nothing more honorable than to cure it.
 MT. Balliett refuted the idea sought to be spread about that patent medi- cines are unpopular by showing that rom 1900 to 1912 the amount of pre- pared medicines consumed in America increased from s100,000,00 to $160.- 100000 annually. He showed that, al though the American Medical Associ- ation is trying as an organization to exterminate so-called patent medi- cines. the family doctor, individually, Is not fighting them but prescribing them. He estimated that 40co of the prescriptions written by doctors today include proprietary medicines.
 The writings of Dr. Harvey w. Wi ley, he said, have also aimed to de- stroy confidence in proprietary medi. cines; but that Dr. Wiley's ideas are not infallible is shown by cases where his analyses were entirely wrong. Mir. Balliett mentioned a case where. with all the power of the Government, he fought preparation as being danger ous to health. and was ingloriously walloped
 There has been spread the idea that a clever faker can mix few useless ingredients and. by smart advertising, sell tons of it and win sudden wealth; whereas, as matter of fact, the medi. cine business is notoriously difficult, and where there has been one success at 1t, there have been a hundred fail ures. Any medicine which has no merit cannot live, because persons who are duped into buying 1t once will not buy it again. and the profit from advertising medicine can only come from repeat sales to the same, satis. fled people. Therefore, any medicine which has been on the market for a number of years, and is still adver- tised. must have merit behind it to ac- count for its success.
 In conclusion Mir Balliett declared that no newspaper is doing justice to its readers in the matter of medical or other advertising, unless 1t investi- gates, not only the wording of the ad- vertisement offered for publication. but the merits of the article adver- tised. He pointed out that the few newspapers who have been deluded advertising have adopted this general policy, rather than to form an inves- tigation bureau of this kind which could, in constructive and useful ef. fort. investigate And decide what is a good product and what Is fraud, in not only the medicine business, but in every other business which adver- tises its wares to the public.
 The audience seemed to agree with MT. Balliett's ideas on the subject and the chairman decided the question at issue in his favor.
 Have Best War Hospital.