Last year, those rationalist killjoys at the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission prosecuted Reckitt Benckiser over four products: Nurofen Migraine Pain, Nurofen Tension Headache, Nurofen Period Pain and Nurofen Back Pain. Their gripe was that ‘each product claimed to target a specific pain, when in fact it was found that they all contained the same amount of the same active ingredient, ibuprofen lysine.’ These variants were often sold at a higher price than the basic brand, despite being pharmacologically identical.
I am sure the ACCC have their chemistry right; their psychology, however, is wrong. For me, Nurofen didn’t go far enough. I want to see even more specific variants: ‘I Can’t Find My Car Keys Nurofen’, perhaps, or ‘Nurofen for People whose Neighbours Like Reggae’. Again, these need contain no additional ingredients: the only distinguishing feature would be the packaging and the promise.
I’m not being entirely frivolous here. Research into the placebo effect shows that branded analgesics are more effective. Promoting something as a cure for a narrowly defined condition, as Nurofen did, also increases placebo power, as does raising the price or changing the colour. So everything the company was doing added to the efficacy of the product.
It is now impossible to buy expensive aspirin in the UK. Yet it is a waste of a wonder drug to sell it for 79p in drab packaging when you could make it much better by packaging it lavishly, colouring it red and charging more. Sometimes I don’t have a 79p headache; I have a £3.29 headache. I try to stockpile the exotic, pricier brands I buy in the US; I find they work better.
Yes, I know it’s bullshit. But that’s the peculiar thing. Placebos work even if you tell people they are placebos.
Comments
Join the debate for just £1 a month
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for £3.
UNLOCK ACCESS Just £1 a monthAlready a subscriber? Log in