madinamerica
Zenobia Morrill
January 29, 2018
[excerpt]
https://www.madinamerica.com/2018/01/researchers-expose-pharmaceutical-industry-misconduct-corruption/Researchers Jay Amsterdam MD, Leemon McHenry PhD, and Jon Jureidini MD recently published a paper aimed at exposing how the pharmaceutical industry corrupts clinical trials through the manipulation of scientific data. They discuss ghostwriting in medical journals, the use of key opinion leaders as co-conspirators, and the failure of top medical journals to uphold standards of science and peer review.
“When the probability of having a ghostwritten, fraudulent, industry-sponsored clinical trial accepted for publication in a high-impact medical journal is substantially higher than the probability of having a critical, deconstruction of the same trial accepted there can be no confidence in the medical literature.â€
The failure to adhere to regulatory standards and scientific and ethical tenets is a significant threat to evidence-based medicine, the authors contend. It is well known that pharmaceutical industry promotional efforts are laundered. In the case of ghostwriting, this involves employing medical communication companies to write research articles, and then academic consultants are paid to take authorship. The details of these unethical practices have recently become more apparent through litigation.
