Ex-NIH Director Lifted conflict of interest rules, Now favors limits on Drug-Company Ties – LAT Sun, 14 Mar 2004 Former Director of the National Institutes of Health, Harold Varmus, MD, appeared before a blue ribbon panel convened by his former agency, ostensibly to shed light on conflict of interest at…
Analysis of S. 1873 – The Biodefense and Pandemic Vaccine and Drug Development Act of 2005 Karen R. Effrem, MD Alliance for Human Research Protection Board of Directors www.ahrp.org INTRODUCTION: This bill seriously endangers, if not completely undermines, the democratic process and the rule of law. It will absolutely destroy…
FDA Commissioner Nominee told Senate He’s Open to Independent Safety Unit / Biogen issues Avonex Warning Fri, 18 Mar 2005 It would be impossible to gain insight into Lester Crawford’s confirmation hearings by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee if one read only one news report. The Los…
NIH ethics review Thu, 15 Jan 2004 There is nothing quite like good investigative journalism to shake public officials from their complacency. An investigative report by David Willman in The Los Angeles Times on Dect 7, 2003, has sent NIH director, Dr. Elias Zirhouni, scrambling to explain why NIH has…
Investigative Press Reports Aug. 7, 2002: Los Angeles Times. UC Seeks to Ease Curbs on Patient Research, by Charles Ornstein and Rebecca Trounson http://www.latimes.com/features/health/medicine/la-me-uc7aug07.story?coll=la%2Dhealth%2Dmedicine SPECIAL REPORT : Experiments on Humans, San Francisco Chronicle August 4, 2002: Business of clinical trials soars, but risks unknown Medical studies give new hope to…
FDA Official Calls Newsletter Unethical – WP / Senate Considers Safety Reform at FDA – LAT Fri, 4 Mar 2005 The Washington Post reports about yet another instance of a high FDA official who misspoke. Dr. Sandra Kweder, Deputy Director of FDA’s Office of New Drugs, sent a letter, “written…
Critics of NIH Studies Prompt Senate Hearing – WashPost Mon, 19 Jan 2004 Accountability is a controversial concept for officials at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Dr. Elias Zirhouni, director of NIH, is scrambling to explain recent revelations of impropriety: First, the agency approved taxpayer money for highly questionable…
Protecting Human Subjects in Research: Are Current Safeguards Adequate? AHRP Testimony submitted to Congressional Committee April 23, 2002 Vera Hassner Sharav, President, and John H. Noble, Jr., Ph.D., steering committee member, The Alliance for Human Research Protection (AHRP), before the Subcommittee on Public Health, Committee on Health, Education, Labor, &…
Intimidation, Politics and Drug Industry Cripple U.S. Medicine – FDA Permits Dr. David Graham to publish Vioxx Report Wed, 5 Jan 2005 FDA officials could not maintain their iron grip in an effort to suppress evidence of far reaching lethal effects of Vioxx when their actions were in full public…
August 7, 2002 University of California Seeks to Ease Curbs on Patient Protection in Research – LA Times FYI Thanks to a series of articles, in the San Francisco Chronicle and Los Angeles Times, the public has been made aware about the back-door efforts to pass a bill in California…
Columbia Journalism Review–The Complicity of the Media in Drug Marketing Wed, 27 Jul 2005 An excellent article in the Columbia Journalism Review examines pharmaceutical industry hype and the media’s role in helping that industry create false impressions about the safety and benefits of newly marketed drugs: “stories trumpeting new drugs…
NIH: Public Servant or Private Marketer? NIH Seeks Outside Inquiry of Alzheimer’s researcher conflicts of interest – LAT Mon, 31 Jan 2005 A year after the Los Angeles Times published its first an in-depth investigative report documenting in detail evidence of major conflicts of interest by top scientists at the…
