Excerpt Six: How Advertisers Profit from Fear

     In some cases the media’s propensity for fear-mongering coincides with commercial opportunism, helping foment the public’s irrational fears. One example is the public’s illogical fear of bacteria. Doctors and scientists have been worried for years that patients’ overuse of antibiotics would create antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

     In the late 1990s, soap manufacturers exploited the public’s fear of bacteria by introducing antibacterial soaps and cleansers designed to sterilize plates, utensils, kitchen and bathroom surfaces, etc. In commercials, a joyful housewife sprays a kitchen countertop with an antibacterial cleanser. The names of disease-causing bacteria vanish as she wipes, leaving the impression of a sterile, healthy household. The scare tactics worked: a 2000 study found that nearly half of all hand and bar soaps contain antibacterial ingredients.

     But the use of such cleaners leaves homes neither sterile nor healthy. As Dr. Stuart Levy of Tufts University explained, “People have to understand that bacteria are necessary and we are not going to sterilize our homes,” he said. “Antibacterial soaps and lotions should be reserved for the sick patients, not the healthy household.” Furthermore he believes the public has a false sense of security about such products. While antibacterial soaps have a place in hospitals, surgeons who use the soap scrub for ten minutes under hot water. The average washing time in a home is about five seconds, Levy said. A quick swipe on a kitchen counter will not kill most bacteria. In 1998 Levy found that E. coli bacteria can develop a resistance to one of the common antibacterial ingredients in store-bought soaps.

     It is also possible that the overuse of such cleansers may help create a new drug-resistant form of tuberculosis. The problem is so serious that in June of 2000, the American Medical Association’s House of Delegates asked government regulators to expedite their review of antibacterial products and determine if they might aggravate the health threat from drug-resistant bacteria. Although the group did not explicitly call for the public to stop using the products, they did express doubts about their usefulness. Said Myron Genel, chairman of the AMA’s Council on Scientific Affairs, “There’s no evidence that they do any good and there’s reason to suspect that they could contribute to a problem.” In the case of antibacterial soaps, the results may end up being catastrophic. More and more people are dying of infectious diseases because they are infected with strains that have become resistant to antibiotics.

     Not surprisingly, the trade group representing antibacterial product manufacturers immediately responded that the public should not be deterred from using antibacterial products, and that the AMA’s action was based on “untested scientific theory.” It is ironic that an industry that has tried so hard to scare consumers into buying their products (“protect your family from E. coli!”) is so concerned about having their consumers scared away by science.

     Some research indicates, in fact, that children exposed to germs may grow up to be healthier adults than those raised in more sterile environments. A study conducted at the University of Arizona College of Medicine found that children who attended day care in their first six months or had two or more older siblings were about half as likely to have asthma at age 13 as children who had one or no older siblings and did not attend day care at that age. Protection from asthma came from frequent exposure to other youngsters if that exposure occurred during the first six months, an important time for the developing immune system. Two studies in Germany found similar results. This finding about asthma is important, as it is the most common chronic childhood disease.

     In any event, using antibacterial soaps is not as important as simply washing your hands. Regular soaps wash away about 99 percent of the unwanted bacteria, according to Dr. James Todd, a professor of pediatrics and microbiology at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center. And anyway, he says, “The antibacterial substance may take many minutes to hours to work. You can’t kill bacteria instantaneously with the stuff you can put in soap. The only thing that can kill bacteria instantly is fire.”

     Who benefits from fanning the public’s fears, both real and unfounded? Lots of people. Drug companies alone spent nearly four billion dollars on advertising in 1998, trying to make the viewing public feel that something’s wrong with them that their medications can fix. Fear opens wallets and purses, and the more advertisers can convince the public that something’s wrong with them, or they or their loved ones are in danger, the more money they make.

     It’s important to remember that one of the tenets of business is that a product or service must have a customer base, and if people don’t need or want what you have to offer, you must make them feel that they do. Increased marketplace competition has driven advertisers to go from simply offering a product to aggressively targeting and pursuing potential consumers.

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