No Free Lunch (organization)

No Free Lunch is a US-based advocacy organization that holds that marketing methods employed by drug companies influence the way doctors and other healthcare providers prescribe medications.^[1] The group does outreach to convince physicians to refuse to accept gifts, money, or hospitality from pharmaceutical companies because it claims that these gifts create a conflict of interest for providers. Such gifts include trips, meals, items of value, and visits to entertainment such as theater and sporting events. The group claims that doctors preferentially prescribe drugs that are marketed to them over better or cheaper options because they are beholden to drug companies from which they accept gifts.^[2] No Free Lunch also argues that doctors should not accept drug samples from drug companies to give to patients because the group believes that the samples will cause the doctors to prescribe those drugs over others.^[3][4] Drug company representatives argue that the free samples can be given to indigent patients.^[5] The group also seeks to convince physicians not to rely on research provided by drug companies for their information about drugs but to base their decisions only on impartial scientific evidence.^[6] No free lunch works with an Australian group called Healthy Skepticism to urge doctors to rely on independent educational materials rather than materials paid for by drug companies for their drug information.^[7]