The recent woes of drugstore cold medicine king Johnson & Johnson are no secret-- the wave of recalls that kicked off in April have been causing big headaches for the company. Too bad they can't treat them!

Okay, that was bad.

Anyway, the recalls that are causing such a mess at J&J are being seen as a big fat opportunity by competitor Novartis.

They're turning the recalls into a marketing campaign -- giving away 250,000 free bottles of a new formula in their popular Triaminic line -- a fever reducer and pain reliever.

To add insult to injury, they're reaching out to parenting websites to let everyone know that there's relief available from "a trusted company." And, just in case anyone's forgotten about the Tylenol that had to go in the trash, the tagline for the giveaway is "restock your medicine cabinet."

Ouch. Bet J&J felt the sting on that one.

But Novartis shouldn't crow too loudly about how trustworthy they are.

After all, we're talking about an acetaminophen-based medicine here. The drug is linked to such varied and dangerous side effects as hearing loss and life-threatening liver damage.

And early this year, I wrote about a teenage girl who nearly lost her life after taking acetaminophen for a headache ("Miracle girl survives killer acetaminophen," 2/1/2010).

But, you know...you can trust Novartis!

If you're a parent or grandparent of a young child, your best answer on this generous gift might be "Thanks, but no thanks."

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