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Recent years have witnessed an upsurge of sociological interest in pharmaceuticals, including on-going research on the regulation of the pharmaceutical industry (Abraham 1995, Abraham and Lewis 2002); related debates on globalisation and the pharmaceutical industry (Busfield 2003); the role of the pharmaceutical industry in so-called'disease mongering'(Blech 2006) and the medicalisation of society (Conrad 2007); the meaning and use of medications in lay culture and everyday life (Britten 1996, Gabe and Lipshitz-Phillips 1982); and studies of pharmacies, pharmacists, prescribing and concordance (Britten et al. 2004, Stevenson et al. 2002, Harding and Taylor 1997).

Pharmaceuticals and the media Another key issue concerns the role and function of the media in relation to pharmaceuticals and the'pharmaceuticalisation'of everyday life. Media coverage of pharmaceuticals, as previous studies have shown, is complex and variable over time. Often, when drugs are first discovered or licensed, media coverage tends to be positive in tone and content, including enthusiastic headlines extolling the virtues of a new ‘breakthrough'or'wonder drug'. Nelkin (1995), for example, highlights the wave of enthusiastic media attention which Prozac (dubbed the'feel good drug') received in the 1990s, with Viagra subsequently following in its footsteps. If or when unwelcome side effects become apparent, however, or misuse of some sort on the part of doctors or the lay populace is detected, then negative constructions or demonisation of the drug in question seems to predominate or prevail. We see this very clearly, for example, with regard to media coverage …