Top Medical Journals Take Action Against the Big Drug Companies

There's unprecedented joint action by the world's top medical journals. The goal: to keep big drug companies from pumping up the benefits and downplaying the risks of new medicines in research studies. Sharyl Attkisson reports on a big ounce of prevention by medical journals.

The unusual editorial was prompted in part by what happened to AIDS researcher Dr. James Kahn. As we reported earlier this year, when Dr. Kahn's study showed an AIDS drug didn't work, the drug maker, which paid for the study, tried to keep Dr. Kahn from publishing the negative results, then sued him for $7 million when he did.

At the time Dr. Kahn of the University of California, San Francisco said, "We were really flabbergasted by this kind of response and I've never seen anything like this."

The editorial warns pharmaceutical companies have too much influence over drug studies, leading critics to say some drugs might not be as safe or as good as the published research claims.

"That line between the author's independent conclusions and the company's conclusions has been blurred," said Dr. Jeffrey Drazen of the New England Journal of Medicine.

Critics allege drug companies tried to bury the risks of highly touted drugs like fen-phen for weight loss and Rezulin for diabetes, drugs that were later pulled from the market for safety reasons. The journals say the problem is there's now so much competition among researchers for pharmaceutical grants, drug companies can virtually dictate the terms of the studies, "terms that are not always in the best interests" of patients and science, and "the results may be buried rather than published if they are unfavorable."

Coincidentally, the drug company suing Dr. Kahn for publishing that negative article dropped its $7 million case against him the day the editorial was published in the medical journals.

To address the problem, the journals are tightening their ethics requirements. One reason they're so concerned is because their credibility is at risk if they inadvertently publish studies that are improperly influenced by drug companies. The pharmaceutical industry responded to the harsh criticism by simply saying it supports the new journal policies.
©MMII CBS Worldwide Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed