Merck's Kevin Nalty Made Fun of ADHD in YouTube Video
Merck dermatology marketing director Kevin Nalty’s week seems to be getting worse: After he was “outed” as the author of hundreds of comedic YouTube videos — including one titled “Farting in Public” — Pharma Marketing Blogger John Mack has located one in which he makes fun of ADHD (video below).
The spot, titled “ADHD Public Service Announcement” comes off as a spoof of an unbranded disease awareness ad of the type that would be made by a drug company selling meds for the condition. Merck doesn’t make an ADHD treatment, but its web site has a page on the condition. The problem is that Nalty’s video essentially makes fun of the industry that employs him. It’s not a crime, but you can see why Merck’s brass might be ticked off by it.
In the video, Nalty starts with the serious tone we’ve come to expect from years of rote pharma advertising:
ADHD is a largely undiagnosed neurological condition characterized by inattention, hyperactivity, and impulsiveness …
You can guess what happens next:
8 million US adults have ADHD, but too few of these have been diagnosed or treated …if you could just hold your knee still for like two seconds! It just keeps drawing my eye away.
It pretty much goes on like for another 2 minutes. There is one priceless line:
It’s a medical condition, much like restless legs syndrome …
In a message to BNET yesterday, Nalty said:
Merck has been reasonable about this, and somewhat indifferent to my “second life.” … Merck’s legitimate concern is that I don’t “represent” Merck or shoot videos on the facility (so I’ve honored that). … Every once in a while one of my videos circulates internally, but it hasn’t yet become a problem.
Jim Edwards, a former managing editor of Adweek, has covered drug marketing at Brandweek for four years, and is a former Knight-Bagehot fellow at Columbia University's business and journalism schools. Follow him on Twitter or send him an email.
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