Why is Massive Conflict of Interest Allowed in Government Health Recommendations?

Posted By Dr. Mercola | December 16 2011 | 275 views

A still-relevant Washington Post article from a few years ago points out that when it comes to medicine, mere disclosure of conflict of interest is not nearly enough.  Patients need unbiased advice, and physicians and scientists with financial ties to the drug industry should not be allowed to be the ones making broad recommendations in the first place.

But this is exactly what happens routinely.  When the federal government issued new recommendations on cholesterol levels, for example, most of the panel members who helped write the recommendations stood to gain enormously from increased use of statins that the new guidelines promoted.

According to the Washington Post:

"Of the nine members of the panel that wrote the guidelines ... only one had no financial links at all ... Is it imaginable that using conflicted experts is the best way of getting an unadulterated assessment of clinical data? I don't think so  ... Doctors who want to be respected as independent authorities should not become paid speakers for drug companies or consult with the industry on marketing issues. These arrangements do not benefit medicine or improve patient care; they only promote the profit goals of the companies."

Sources:

  Washington Post August 1, 2004