How long will drug companies continue to get away with conduct their testing in this way?

Question

2 years ago I attended a lecture by the head of research publishing in the British medical journal.

In the questions and answers section one of the things mentioned by the lecturer was, drug testing is designed and conducted by the companies that develop them. Effectively the testing of them is not independent.

This is unlikely to change as big pharma give millions to the republican and democrat campaigns and would withdraw the funding of either party trying to challenge this.

Companies that spend millions developing products want them passed as safe.

Does anyone notice a hint of bias here?

There seems to be an incredible double standard. Supporters of Allopathic medicine routinely ignore and discredit alt-med research as unscientific, not independent, biased and effectively ‘untrustworthy’. However they have no hesitation in backing the results issued by manufacturers of allopathic remedies and find them for some reason to be ‘trustworthy’.

Answer 1

Bias enters the testing of drugs at doctor/ patient end, with strong pressure on the physician to produce the good results, while suppressing the negative effects. An 'independent testing agency' would be invaluable.

Answer 2

The BBC made a documentery called Secrets of the Drug Trials, it can be dowloaded from bit che using bitttorrent.

It showed suppression of some of the negative effects of drugs by drug companiees, especially when it came to antidepressants, how people have suicidal thoughts whilst on them, and some people in the study killed themselves, during the clinical trial, this was suppressed, until by legal action these internal documents were forced to the surface by lawyers of families whose loved one's commited a suicide due to the drug.

What about Vioxx, Merck has admitted killing 50,000 Americans, they have to pay millions out in compensation.

These drug companies dont have our health as their number 1 priority, the number 1 priority is profit $$$$$, fueled by greed, causing unecessary suffering of humanity, and treatments that do work, are criticised and called quackery.

watch david ickes video freedom from facism on google video

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=...

He talks about these thing in great detail

Hope this helps.

Answer 3

The legal drugs industry worldwide is $300bn a year.  That's higher than Switzerland's GDP.

The 2 main tricks the drugs companies use to pretend their drugs are effective are:

1. Burying studies until they produce a favourable one.

2. Not using an actice placebo and refusing to check whether the blind remained intact.  An active placebo is one which mimcs the short-term 'buzz' of the drug.  In 80% of studies, patients are able to correctly guess whether they took the drug or the placebo.  *

Needless to say, the drug will always then outperform the placebo, even if the drug is useless.  Such studies should be binned.

While skeptics of alternative medicine often assume that any benefits come from the placebo effect they fail to realise that the same has been true of almost all traditional medicine - and is often proven:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/726349...

There needs to be some kind of campaign group fighting for a level playing field but until then write to your MP:

http://www.writetothem.com/

*How Sound Is the Double-Blind Design for Evaluating Psychotropic Drugs?

Seymour Fisher, PhD and Roger P Greenberg, PhD

The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease Vol.181, No.6, 1993

Edit: good to see I've got two thumbs-down.  Presumably from the pro-science brigade who don't understand double-blind methodology.

Answer 4

I understand that any sensible company tests it's products before they are sold on the market. In the case of medicines there is also a regulatory body that verifies the product is safe.

I expect that you would be the first to sue if an untested drug caused you harm.

I do understand that you are writing about self testing but that is a first step in the verification procedure.

Answer 5

I'm on the complete page as you on this.  So instead of voicing my agreement, I'll try to answer your question

(and add that you should read trust us, we're experts, since it relates to a lot of what you're talking about here, and probably covers things you don't know yet).

Other than that, my opinion is "probably forever," considering that the problem is getting progressively worse.

Basically, everything you're detailing here is another consequence of facism (assuming its defined by mussolini's definition; as a union between government and corporate power).  Our culture is moving further and further towards a fascist economy, and it doesn't show any sign of abating.

So in this context, if the government which 'should be regulating' consumer safety, they will just regulate in a way that benefits corporate power, ie. arrest independent medical practitioners and allow pharmaceutical companies to continue doing as they please.

I really hope the facist age is ending, but it seems as though we've only seen the beginning of it.  Hopefully at some point people will get pissed off enough about the bad health care they're receiving, but if trust us we're experts is correct at all, it will take a long time for that outrage to manifest.

Answer 6

Well, once upon a time, in the USA anyway, the government was supposed to be "of the people, by the people, and for the people". Then along came control of the media and the higher education facilities by the elite. They have patiently, systematically, and successfully, brainwashed the public so completely, that we no longer have a say so in how things are governed. The only thing that gets politicians' attention any longer is money. Unless or until people take back control of the government, nothing is going to change. We can sit here and talk until we're blue in the face and the status quo will not waiver. Until we do as the blacks under Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. did, as women in the seventies did, or, more recently, as the g**s have done, and get in the limelight of the media's eye and get the word out... we're doomed to suffer under the auspices of the elite pharmas and allopaths. Alas, getting the public's attention would require a monumental grass roots effort and the obstacles would be formidable.

Sounds like a good fight, though... I'm game.

Answer 7

Yes there are scores of loopholes in the drugs industry.

I read the other day that thousands of people have lost their lives after being prescribed so called scientific medication.

This is something they work hard at to hide-along with the benefits of various forms of alternative medicine-

Answer 8

Effectively Big Pharma would love it if we would just blindly go along with the pill popping and symptom masking scenario they have perpetuated upon us, the blind meek & mild little sheep ............. tis the blind leading the blind .....  what they don't care about is what is actually causing people's ill health & disease ............  they have nothing to gain & everything to lose by actually telling people the real truth about the drugs they mass produce & dispense at an alarming rate ...........  it is up to us as free thinking, clear minded individuals to realise that we firstly need to  take responsibility for our own good health and avoid to the best of our knowledge and ability getting into a disease ridden state to start with and when ill health does befall us to acknowledge that nuturing & feeding our bodies with the nutrition & vitamins & hydration it so desperately needs & resolving our issues from the source will only ever really be the most finite solution ............  sad but oh so very true ♥

CHEERS

♥

Answer 9

Science geek is right.  You are sadly misinformed and lack understanding as to how this all works.

The FDA sets standards regarding what type of data is required in order for it to approve a new drug.  It is up to the sponsor to generate the appropriate data.  The FDA has the right and the responsibility to Audit the studies in order to verify that they were done in a manner to eliminate bias.  AND THEY DO, ALL THE TIME.  There are records of several studies that were not allowed because the FDA auditors found sufficient cause to suspect the data.  They forced the sponsoring company to re-do the studies.

Now, find me ANY alt-med company that is doing ANY research that could meet these requirements.  You won't, because it just doesn't happen.

Drug testing is NOT "conducted by the companies".  It is SPONSORED by the companies - they hire INDEPENDENT researchers to do the studies for them.  (Yes, they get paid - they don't work for free!) The protocols are reviewed by INDEPENDENT research committees, which are required to have at least one non-medical representative.  If you don't believe me, or really want to see how this process works, you should contact a nearby medical school and ask about being on their committee.  It is this INDEPENDENT conduct, review, and audit process that assures the "trustworthiness" of the research.

There IS a "double standard".  Alt med companies are given a free pass - there is no requirement for proof of efficacy or safety.  What passes as "evidence" is usually just anecdotes or "trials" that were conducted under such biased conditions that no scientist would trust the results.  But they pass this off to the masses as "research".  And the gullible buy it.

I fail to see any relevance in the Enron story.  The situation is not comparable.  The auditors for the pharmaceutical studies are not selected or paid by the companies they are auditing, so there is no opportunity to influence their findings.