MSD cuts ties with Schbang after Poonam Pandey fake death stunt backfires

Days after Schbang released a statement attaching itself to Poonam Pandey’s fake death due to cervical cancer, US drug company Merck’s Indian affiliate MSD has dropped the digital marketing agency.

A spokesperson from MSD said the association was ceased on the grounds of conflict of interest and clarified saying, “MSD would like to categorically state that the recent public relations activity on HPV prevention carried out by Poonam Pandey and digital marketing agency Schbang was neither initiated with MSD’s endorsement nor made with the knowledge of MSD. is of the view that disease awareness is important for prevention and protection of people against certain HPV-related cancers and diseases, therefore it is critical that such messages are always scientifically and medically accurate whilst being delivered in an appropriate manner.”

The pharma company’s action comes at a time, when a theory has been doing the rounds that the stunt was a silent marketing strategy to boost sales of the Gardasil vaccine, which fights the cervical cancer-causing human papillomavirus.

In a LinkedIn post, Mahesh Murthy, a venture capitalist and a marketing individual, traced the lines of the names involved in the stunt to find that Pandey is represented by #Xtra Media, the sister company of Fork Media Group (which runs Hauterrfly), and it creates content for advertisers.

This appeared to strengthen the view that what was marketed as cervical cancer awareness is a planned promotional strategy by a company that has been in pursuit of the Indian market.

The stunt also coincided with Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s speech to promote HPV vaccination amongst girls between the ages of 9 to 14.     

On February 3, the Schbang issued an apology statement acknowledging that the "act by Pandey" led to making cervical cancer and related terms the most searched topics on Google. According to the company, "this is the first time in the history of this country that the term 'cervical cancer' has appeared in over 1000 headlines."

Info@BestMediaInfo.com