Print Laboratories under the microscope
Analysis of the role of the pharmaceutical industry
Debate about the boundaries of the business of drugs.
A trial and pose novel ethical boundaries of business: The authors call for more critical against a rush to get a drug
Now many CAP no longer accept input from reps.
Drug companies embody the role of endorsements in science and health to talk about drugs that cure, that manage to stop infections, which remove pain. But they are also sometimes associated with an industry that pursues a very immediate benefit, economic success at any cost. Two books in bookstores now agree, an essay and a novel, to bring his vision about the intricacies of this sector.
Medical Laboratory, Miguel Jara (Peninsula), proposed in his essay a journey inside medicine and the pharmaceutical industry through the health visitor, a figure disputed in this work by promoting business assumptions, juicy for business but sometimes at the expense of the interests of the patient. This is the game of Jara thesis: most laboratories pursue the profitability of their medications but sometimes it involves ignoring the rights of citizens.
Miguel Jara, writer and journalist, a researcher in health and ecology, a former correspondent in Spain of the British Medical Journal, has heard dozens of stories of visitors who say they are kidnapped by their work. Laboratories That put pressure on doctors to prescribe their products through their sales teams is something that few others see legend and reality. When the case of "institutionalized form," insists the author, the public can expect to pay a toll of health, deteriorates the prestige of medicine, and is a fraud on the public finances.
Since 2002, the relationship between pharmaceutical companies and physicians is regulated by a Code of Practice. And the industry defends him: "This endowed code of appropriate self-regulation, whose breach entails serious economic penalties for companies filed, "said Julian Zabala, director of communications Farmaindustria.
The situation began to change a decade ago. "Scientific societies are much more vigilant when a specialist participates in an investigation prompted declaration of conflict of interest," said Dr. James Sellarés, board member of Metges Col.legi of Barcelona. "We can not ensure that there are these bad practices, but not like before. Is a model of century past, in which the administration itself left in the hands of industry training for doctors. " And with economic cutbacks, the industry has fewer resources to invest in physicians. "Now many CAP will not accept the entry of visitors," said Sellarés.
The novel which exposes the murky machinations of the pharmaceutical industry is the subtitle that Metro has been used as bait to morbid for Gods in white coats, the fiction he has written an oncologist Barcelona, \u200b\u200bJosep Ramon Lluch Germà , director of knowledge management and department head of Medical Oncology at the Institut Català d'Oncologia (ICO). Is part of the world of clinical trials, the desire to succeed and the rush to get there. The central scenario is Barcelona and their oncologists star.
"I had the need for it is possible to report when things are not done right," says the author. Again according to his thesis, the rush has led to the occurrence of deaths from long-term effects of drugs that had not been sufficiently studied. "The story is based on real events, but set in the field of oncology, because it is what I know best, not because he is telling something that happened with drugs for cancer, "he says.
Germà Lluch recalls some drugs in the more or less recent history were extremely harmful for various failures during the investigation and that are now banned and withdrawn. As a drug, thalidomide, for nausea during pregnancy, depending on when he took caused serious injuries to the fetus. O estrogen for menopause, which if taken for more than five years increased the incidence of breast cancer . Always using that game between reality and fiction, recalls the problems Lluch giving an anti-diabetic heart retired just two years ago in France.
"The rush and pressure us to lose critical," says Lluch. This shortcoming and the huge amount of money at stake "make us lose sight sometimes why things are done." In the novel tells a world of clinical trials almost chain through effective external companies themselves coldly laboratories that meet the test objective, regardless of their impact. A world of healing measured in many zeros. Fact or fiction, asks the reader. "Taking a drug can cost 1,700 million dollars and it takes 12 or 14 years. Now you try it in 7 or 8. May be little time to see what the long-term effects. "
The two big agencies that allow drugs (U.S. FDA and European EMA) are the same institutions that have to withdraw a drug if it is not going well, says the oncologist. And besides, the industry can pay to have the review process be shortened. "We still critical, he adds. need more than ever, discussion groups on the clinical benefit has to be minimum a drug ".* Meanwhile, questions remain about the functioning of the European Medicines Agency. For many MEPs, the agency responsible for ensuring their safety, is too sensitive to the interests of big pharma and the Parliament last week not only refused to endorse their accounts the past two years but ordered the opening of a research on the origin of financial resources, Beatriz Navarro reports. "There is no guarantee that the development of medicines is carried out by independent experts," says Parliament, warning of possible "conflict of interest" in the Agency. MEPs question the actions of the Agency in the case of a drug to treat diabetes (benflourex before sold as Mediator), which took 10 years off the market since the first reports warning of dangerous side effects. The agency has been accused of lacking transparency. It took a decision of the Ombudsman for the Agency agreed to publish reports on clinical trials held in secret on the grounds of not harming the interests of manufacturers.
against selective publication of trials
In an article published on 11 in the British Medical Journal, doctors Danish Anders Jørgensen Peter Gotzsche and blame the European Medicines Agency (EMEA) of having "the profits of drug companies over the protection of life and welfare of the patient. " In particular, complain of "selective publication" of the tests done on drugs. This practice, they say, is "widespread" carried "overestimate benefits and underestimate the damage" of drugs, which makes "doctors can not choose the best treatment for our patients. " Gøtzsche and Jørgensen highlight the "disastrous consequences" that it may have, as was seen with the painkiller rofecoxib, "which probably unnecessary caused 100,000 heart attacks in the U.S.". These physicians reported that it took more than three years to ensure that the EMP will provide the evidence published on the anti-obesity drug Rimonabant, in 2010, was withdrawn because of side effects.
http://www.lavanguardia.com/salud/20110517/54154975652/debate-sobre-los-limites-del-negocio-de-los-farmacos.html
0 comments:
Post a Comment