Jackson Rx Drug Homicide May Have Chilling Effect on Celebrity Pill Pushing

By Stacy Jenel Smith

Is it too much to say that Michael Jackson's death might end up helping us -- by putting a scary face on the argument that America is on drug overload? I don't think so.

You might believe that the star, as extremely troubled as he was extremely indulged, was so many light years away from average citizens that he and his personal Dr. Feelgood have nothing to do with us.

But, Jackson and we average Joes do have parallels: We live in a culture where pharmaceuticals seem to be offered as solutions to every problem, where they're widely accepted as Answer No. 1 to whatever ails us.

This week, headlines screamed that Jackson's death had been ruled a homicide. Stories detailed how his doctor, Conrad Murray, had been giving him mega drugs for weeks to help him sleep, shooting him up with propofol, lidocaine, lorazepam and midazolam, on top of giving him a tablet of Valium, in the hours before he died.

Also this week, a casting notice went out calling for a "celebrity insomniac" -- true! The job: to serve as the spokesperson for what is being described as an educational program about insomnia treatment, which no doubt means commercials for a pharmaceutical product. This could be a million dollar job, "depending on media marketability and recognizability" of the star, according to the breakdown.

The qualified personality has to have been diagnosed with insomnia. The campaign will be developed around the personality, who will grant use of his or her name, likeness and quotes in ads, press releases and on a website. Producers are looking for "A and B list candidates interested in discussing their experiences."

How's that for irony?

As with everything -- and I do mean everything, heaven help us -- in the U.S.A., celebrities lead the way. If they can sell handbags and cars by virtue of their glamour and panache, goodness knows they can sell drugs. Even ones we might not need or that might not be good for us.

Will Jackson's death have a chilling effect on celebrity pill pushing? How about the over-amped hyping of medicine in general?

It's sickening to read the list of drugs to which Jackson was addicted and think about how they affected his body in his last months -- and this isn't a case of speedballs or other illicit drugs such as killed stars like John Belushi and River Phoenix. Jackson's drugs were all legal.

So were the drugs that took the life of Heath Ledger last year. The 28-year-old died after ingesting a lethal cocktail consisting of: OxyContin; Hydrocodone (an ingredient in Vicodin); Diazepam or Valium; Alprazolam or Xanax; Temazepam or Restoril (prescribed for insomnia); and Doxylamine, an antihistamine over-the-counter sleep aid sold in the U.S. as Unisom.

In 2007, a combination of prescription and over-the-counter drugs killed Anna Nicole Smith. Those included three antidepressant or anti-anxiety drugs, plus a sleep medication.

Dorothy Dandridge, Judy Garland, Marilyn Monroe, Keith Moon -- they all died from overdoses of legal drugs as well.

In September 1979, Elvis Presley's private physician, Dr. George Nichopoulos, was charged by the Tennessee Board of Medical Examiners with "indiscriminately prescribing 5,300 pills and vials for Elvis in the seven months before his death." He was later acquitted.

Why might Jackson's death make more of an impact on society than those celebrities? Because it comes at a time when signs point to Americans reaching a tipping point of annoyance with the overselling of drugs.

Right now, there's a raging debate over direct-to-consumer drug advertising -- a practice legal only in the United States and in New Zealand, which has to tell you something. A 2001 study out of Emory University found that average American viewers were subjected to more than 30 hours of drug commercials a year. Since the amount of money spent to purchase commercial time has gone up considerably since then -- to $4.8 billion last year, according to Nielsen -- chances are we've moved past 30 hours per annum by now.

It's not the array of life-saving modern miracle medications that has people complaining, let's be clear. It's the obvious excesses. Restless legs and four-hour erections and other problems the public didn't seem to have a decade ago tell the tale. Doctors have volunteered that these days, they find themselves talking patients out of medications they've seen on TV that aren't appropriate for them.

Several congressmen have recently proposed legislation, on grounds from safety to decency, that would quiet the constant chorus of pharmaceutical flogging. Consumer advocates, ad executives and others have been making the predictable free speech vs. public good arguments in op-ed pages and on the air.

Greg Critser, author of "Fat Land," "Generation Rx" and the forthcoming "Eternity Soup," reminded New York Times readers the other day that "In his lone dissent from the 1976 Supreme Court case that enabled drug companies to advertise, Justice William Rehnquist observed that 'the societal interest against the promotion of drug use for every ill, real and imaginary, seems to me exceptionally strong.'" Rehnquist was talking about dangers he perceived in selling drugs the way you sell toothpaste and deodorant, as he put it.

Free speech aside, Nobody wants to give up such gigantic ad revenue at a time like this, though, so the legislation isn't likely to pass.

But, a public clamor for change could force advertisers to reach out to consumers in a more conscientious way -- less offensive, ridiculous and manipulative. Prescription medication shouldn't be treated like magic candy that can make everything all better.

Which brings us back to Michael Jackson. Sadly, he seems to have thought exactly that.