Big Pharma is not evil. They are partly responsible for the many medications which are keeping most of us still here. Direct to consumer advertising history is here
Direct-to-consumer advertising - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
It is the FDA which requires the listing of possible side effects in those ads. The package insert which the consumer does not receive with your medication but is available online lists all adverse events that occurred during the premarket testing of the medication including those which may not be caused by the drug but simply happened at a rate higher than that observed either in a placebo arm of a study or at a rate higher than that in an established database. There does not have to be a documented cause and effect relationship. Rare but serious possibilities need to be listed. If a medication has a 50% chance of helping and a .01% chance of harming the benefit greatly outweighs the risk. With complementary medicine the chance of helping is almost always unknown as there is no requirement for any data to be produced and it is not produced as a zero benefit would harm the market. However the risk of harm is almost always extremely low (but not always
12 Dangerous Dietary Supplements ) other than the fact that it may be used by some consumers in place of therapies that could actually help (or harm) them. Some people who chose Laetrile or Krebiozen could have been saved by Big Pharma but instead died at the hands of "alternative" BS.