I think it’s fantastic that Lunesta, the sleep-aid drug, designed and marketed to help you fall asleep, lists among its side effects: May cause drowsiness. Well, yeah, I would really hope so. That’s what people are paying for, after all.

Even better, the asthma drug Advair warns patients that taking it “may increase the chance of asthma-related death.” Well, that’s a nice change from all those regular medicines that try to prevent your disease from doing more harm to you.

I think my personal favorite, though, has to be the anti-depressant drug Zoloft. Not for the side effects, but for the actual effects. They come right out and say this in their ads: “Although the cause is unknown, depression may be linked to a chemical imbalance in the brain. Zoloft may help to correct this imbalance.” So they are admitting that a.) they don’t know what causes the problem b.) they might have kind of an idea about something related to the problem (c.) their product might affect what they think may be related to the problem although it doesn’t outright cure it and d.) they’re not entirely sure what, if anything, their product does.

Of course, if you want to talk side effects, Zoloft lists “sexual dysfunction” as a possibility. Great, take a guy who’s already depressed and make it so his junk doesn’t work. The suicide rate’s going to skyrocket.

The miracles of modern marketing… er, medicine.