“Drug Makers, Profit and Greed”
Drug makers have been guilty of egregiously sleazy practices in the past and the future bodes more of the same. Drug firms have withheld unfavorable data on profitable drugs. Drug firms have failed to timely report possible safety concerns and accurate performance data, sometimes for years. Drug names, such as Avandia, Celebrex, Zyprexia and Vioxx bring forth bad memories of sordid practices by the pharmaceutical industry. They have put out reports written by employees or paid consultants, rather than by the academic investigators named as the lead authors. All the while, The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) moves at sloth speed to correct these atrocities. Dr. Catherine DeAngelis, editor of JAMA, has said, “This is just the tip of the iceberg.
