Man, is it me or does it seem like there's more and more ads on the TV for drugs? They all show people running around with their children, talking about their ailments and how the drug helped them with their ailments, followed by about fifteen seconds of all sorts of nasty things that the drugs may cause. Some of them actually seem useful (like the cholestoral stuff). Some of them might be useful (Propecia). Some of them I have no idea what they're for. And then there's this one, for Lamisil that I caught today.

What great ailment does Lamisil claim to solve? Toe nail fungus.

Yes, toe-nail fungus.

Apparently, there's this fungus that gets on your toe-nails and makes them look off-color. This is a bad thing.

So, we get the ad. In the ad, a bunch of normal, well-adjusted white people are shown being active and as we see them doing normal, well-adjusted white people type things, we get a voice-over of how they woke up one day and found out that their usually pearly white toe-nails were now no longer pearly white. After summoning up every ounce of courage that they had, they asked the doctor what was causing this problem and told to try Lamisil.

This is followed by all the people in the ads talking about what a difference Lamisil made and how happier and fulfilling their lives are. As we hear this, we get shots of all the people in the commercial running around barefoot- in their office, at home, out in the yard- with close-ups of their wonderfully fungi-free toe nails.

And, oh, by the way, it could cause liver damage, but what's a little liver damage when your toe-nails are perfect.

Once again, I'd like to thank the wonderful people out there who've come up with some new thing we're all supposed to worry about and then giving us something that miraculously cures these new ailments. Meanwhile, AIDS is ravaging most of the Third-World, but we here in America can get cheap anti toe-nail fungus pills.

Thank you Lamisil. Thank you.