Avandia Supporters Had Financial Ties to Drug Companies

Soon after Avandia was linked with an increased risk of heart attacks, a team of researchers at the Mayo Clinic reviewed more than 200 scientific studies that were favorable to Avandia and found that 94% of those authors had financial ties to the drug companies, including GlaxoSmithKline. Nearly half of those had monetary arrangements with pharmaceutical companies that posed a serious conflict of interest.
According to Reuters, “It was almost three to four times more likely that somebody who had a relationship with a pharmaceutical company had a favorable opinion about the medication,” Dr Victor Montori of the Mayo Clinic, whose study appears in the British Medical Journal, said in a telephone interview.”
This is precisely why the manner in which these scientific studies are done has to be reformed. If the author of a so-called scientific study is being remunerated by a drug company, the author has a financial interest in writing favorably on behalf of his client. That’s not objective science.
What is perhaps more troubling in the Reuters article is that 25% of those who did have financial ties with the drug companies failed to disclose such a relationship.
The FDA plans to hold a meeting sometime in July to discuss the risks and benefits of the drug Avandia. The meeting will take place after two US senators released a report from FDA safety officials who recommended removing Avandia from the marketplace.