Subject: Press (lack of) coverage viz "conflict of interest" (guru)..
Date: Thu, 1 Jun 2000 082050 -0500 (CDT)
From: "Roy L. Beavers"
To: emfguru
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.......As part of our (guru's!!) campaign to "shine the light" upon
the serious "conflict of interest" standard-operating-procedure (SOP)
which is manifest in the U.S. "scientific" community -- let us take
note of the following news report......
One of the reasons that "science" is so **casual** about these
"conflict of interest" practices ... is because our "watch-dog" press
lets them get away with it.....!!!
SPEAKING OF WHICH -- I would like to see the WHO (World Health
Organization) require that ALL of its "science" principals (like
Repacholi) make public ALL sources of income they receive.....!!!
It is NOT unheard of -- that employees of the U.N. organizations ...
are being paid by "other" sources ... outside of their U.N. employer.....
That would, in effect, place the WHO researchers on a par with what we
are now expecting of (EMF/EMR) researchers in the U.S. and Canada......!!!
Cheerio.....
Roy Beavers (EMFguru) You gotta SHOWME -- I'm from Missouri....
roy@emfguru.com
.....It is better to light a single candle than to curse the darkness.....
NEW!!! Website... http://emfguru.com
...................People are more important than profits.................
DO YOU KNOW OF OTHERS WHO SHOULD BE ON THIS LIST???
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01:03 PM ET 05/31/00
Study Criticizes Media Drug Coverage
By KATHARINE WEBSTER=
Associated Press Writer=
A study of how the mass media cover health found that many news
stories on drugs fail to report side effects or researchers'
financial ties to the companies that make the medications.
The researchers looked at 207 newspaper and TV stories from 1994
to 1998 on three drugs: aspirin, used to prevent heart disease;
pravastatin, a cholesterol-lowering drug also used to prevent heart
disease; and alendronate, a drug for preventing and treating
osteoporosis.
In the 170 stories that cited experts or scientific studies,
half included at least one expert or study with financial ties to
the drug's manufacturer. Of those, only 40 percent reported the
potential conflict of interest.
The study also found that fewer than half the news stories
reported the drugs' side effects and only 30 percent noted their
cost.
The study by researchers from Harvard University and Harvard
Pilgrim Health Care, a managed care insurer, was being published in
Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine, whose incoming editor
has been criticized for an apparent conflict of interest involving
a drug company.
Wire service stories were included in the study, including some
by The Associated Press.
Forty percent of the stories studied did not report the numbers
behind the claims of medical benefits. Among the 124 stories that
did quantify the benefits of a drug, 83 percent reported only the
relative benefit and 2 percent reported only the absolute benefit.
Just 15 percent reported both, the study found.
For example, many 1996 stories about an alendronate study said
the drug would cut an osteoporosis patient's risk of a broken hip
in half _ the relative benefit. But most failed to include the
absolute reduction in risk, from a 2 percent chance of a hip
fracture to 1 percent.
Reporting only the relative benefit is ``an approach that has
been shown to increase the enthusiasm of doctors and patients for
long-term preventive treatments and that could be viewed as
potentially misleading,'' the authors wrote.
Some studies do not report absolute benefits. Others look at
drugs in the experimental phase; manufacturers will not release a
price until the drug is approved and on the market.
In addition, while the top medical journals require researchers
to report their financial ties to drug companies, some studies do
not include the information because a researcher fails to disclose
it.
``The financial entanglements can be essential information for
these science stories, and we want to provide readers whatever
details we can,'' said Mike Silverman, deputy managing editor for
national news of The Associated Press.
``We try very hard to provide an adequate context for the
readers, and sometimes the information is available in (medical)
journal articles or obtainable in interviews on deadline, and
sometimes it isn't,'' said Cornelia Dean, science editor of The New
York Times, another of the publications studied.
``I think it makes some really valuable points,'' Rob Stein,
science editor for The Washington Post, said of the study. ``I
think there's a real danger of oversimplifying these things.''
The study was led by Ray Moynihan, a fellow at the Commonwealth
Fund, a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving health care.
Funding was provided by the Commonwealth Fund and the Harvard
Pilgrim Health Care Foundation, a nonprofit organization linked to
the insurer.
The incoming editor of the journal this week responded to
reports about an apparent conflict of interest stemming from his
ties to drug companies. Dr. Jeffrey Drazen, who becomes editor in
July, said he may have made a mistake last year when he praised a
new asthma drug made by a company that had hired him to evaluate
studies about the medication. He also said he would divest himself
of any financial interests in drug companies before taking over as
editor.
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Archive provided courtesy of WaveGuide, http://www.wave-guide.org
Reprinted with permission of Roy Beavers, http://www.emfguru.com