Revealed: Why so many adults in Britain are wearing nappies - and are being misled into using them rather than seeking treatment By Rosie Taylor Published: 02:00, 11 June 2024 | Updated: 02:00, 11 June 2024 e-mail View comments The silver-haired actor Harry Van Gorkum — who once starred in Friends as Monica’s British ‘soulmate’ Don — stands in a luxury apartment in his underwear and looks confidently at the camera. ‘Now we’re comfortable, let’s talk urine leakage,’ he says, holding up an incontinence pad for men which he promises ‘slips discreetly into my underwear’. Not so long ago it would have been unthinkable to see this on prime-time TV.
But while it’s undeniable that advertising like this is helping open up conversations around incontinence, critics warn that this kind of marketing also exploits people’s embarrassment — encouraging them to buy products to soak up leaks instead of seeking medical help for an often treatable problem. Meanwhile, there are concerns that people in hospital or care homes, particularly older patients, are falling victim to a ‘pad culture’, which means that, even if they are not incontinent, they are put in nappies (and then left in them for hours). Incontinence affects more than one in five people in the UK and demand for products to treat it is soaring.
Friends actor Harry Van Gorkum in an advert for Tena where he holds up an incontinence pad that he promises 'slips discreetly into my underwear' Incontinence af.