Direct-to-consumer
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Direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising is when a manufacturer, particularly a pharmaceutical company, promotes its product directly to the consumer and not merely to middlemen in the chain of distribution, such as physicians.
There used to be no DTC advertising by pharmaceuticals. But recently there has been an enormous increase in DTC advertising for prescription drugs, and this has yielded a 32% increase in sales of prescription drugs. In 2004, the pharmaceutical industry spent $4.2 billion on DTC advertisements for prescription medications.