Editorial Note: Crusoe has not been lying low since The Shipwreck of the Singular and The Girl who Wasn't Heard When She Cried Wolf. Check these out for previous Crusoe posts. The AbbVie story calls for a decent myth. Here is a start. Sink all vaccines to the bottom of the sea? Crusoe was listening to Oliver give out. "They called me yesterday evening", he said, "to tell me … [Read more...] about Medystopia
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EMA v AbbVie
Editorial Note: Three months ago we launched an AbbVie campaign and followed it up with a petition calling on AbbVie and InterMune to drop their action against EMA (European Medicines Agency). The hope was to raise awareness of this critically important issue that had been sailing beneath the radar. Over 6000 of you from more than 120 countries responded. This interim … [Read more...] about EMA v AbbVie
The Church of GSKology 2
A century ago Freud and Jung made us aware of the biases underpinning what patients say. Not everything should be accepted at face value. In particular claims of abuse may not be based on reality. We needed experts – analysts – they claimed to tease out what is real from what is not. The Catholic Church was once intensely hostile to Freud, but when it came to child abuse … [Read more...] about The Church of GSKology 2
Lives Touched by GSK
(Anonymous) Notes of a Paxil guinea pig What does GSK owe to the youngsters in its infamous Study 329 who became suicidal while taking the company’s paroxetine (Paxil/Seroxat)? As someone who was briefly a GSK Guinea Pig, I’d say the most important thing they’re owed is the truth. It’s a highly delinquent debt – but it’s not too late for GSK to pay up. I took part in a … [Read more...] about Lives Touched by GSK
The Church of GSKology
Editorial Note: This post is about midway through a series of posts that are broadly part of the AbbVie series. The series began with GSK's Transparency and Access Journey, moved on to The House of GSK and will have at least two more posts after this. Reading the Minneapolis StarTribune, it was the reference to privacy that clinched it. Facing a sexual abuse lawsuit, the … [Read more...] about The Church of GSKology
The House of GSK
In a just published article in the BMJ, Peter Doshi notes how in recent months the English pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) have assiduously portrayed themselves as advocates of transparency and in support of access to clinical trial data. Well in support of 'Responsible Access'. Responsible essentially means that a researcher commits to the primacy of RCTs and … [Read more...] about The House of GSK
Trade Wars we have known and loved: Brand EFPIA v Korea
Editorial note: a slight variation of this appeared last week on The Conversation. In 2010, the European Ombudsman ruled that the European Medicines Agency should open access to clinical trials data when companies applied to get their drugs on the market. The ombudsman decided public health was more important than considerations of commercial confidentiality. In February … [Read more...] about Trade Wars we have known and loved: Brand EFPIA v Korea
Health Action International: Access to Trial Data
Editorial Note: Leah Cowan and Ancel-la Santos from Health Action International wrote this post covering the release of a HAI position paper on Access to Clinical Trial Data. HAI have been to the forefront of the move to patient reporting of Adverse Events. It has a position as a partner with the European Consumer Organization (BEUC) in support of EMA in the current legal … [Read more...] about Health Action International: Access to Trial Data
GSK’s Transparency and Access Journey
Editorial Note: This post has been put together by Peter Goetzsche and David Healy Dear Dr Goetzsche ... "At GSK we firmly believe that making more information available, including clinical study reports and anonymised patient-level data, will enable researchers to study the science behind today’s medicines more closely, to learn more about them and how they can best be … [Read more...] about GSK’s Transparency and Access Journey
SHIT Happens – 2
SHIT stands for Secret Health Ingredient in Treatment - see SHIT Happens. In the early twentieth century SHIT was some supposedly secret magic chemical. In the early twenty-first century SHIT is important information about adverse effects of a drug that has been kept hidden. In SHIT Happens, we reported that RxISK has adverse event data on a range of GSK, Pfizer, Lilly and … [Read more...] about SHIT Happens – 2