2/18/10

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• A Big Pharma clinical trial researcher has been caught faking dozens of research studies for the top drug companies -- studies that were published in "scientific" medical journals.

The data that "proved" the effectiveness of some of pharma's most profitable drugs was
simply created out of thin air!
Read more…
Big Pharma researcher admits to faking dozens of research studies for Pfizer, Merck (opinion)

It's being called the largest research fraud in medical history. Dr. Scott Reuben, a former member of Pfizer's speakers' bureau, has agreed to plead guilty to faking dozens of research studies that were published in medical journals.

Now being reported across the mainstream media is the fact that Dr. Reuben accepted a $75,000 grant from Pfizer to study Celebrex in 2005. His research, which was published in a medical journal, has since been quoted by hundreds of other doctors and researchers as "proof" that Celebrex helped reduce pain during post-surgical recovery. There's only one problem with all this: No patients were ever enrolled in the study!

Dr. Scott Reuben, it turns out, faked the entire study and got it published anyway.

It wasn't the first study faked by Dr. Reuben: He also faked study data on Bextra and Vioxx drugs, reports the Wall Street Journal.

As a result of Dr. Reuben's faked studies, the peer-reviewed medical journal Anesthesia & Analgesia was forced to retract 10 "scientific" papers authored by Reuben.The Day of London reports that 21 articles written by Dr. Reuben that appear in medical journals have apparently been fabricated, too, and must be retracted.

After being caught fabricating research for Big Pharma, Dr. Reuben has reportedly signed a plea agreement that will require him to return $420,000 that he received from drug companies. He also faces up to a 10-year prison sentence and a $250,000 fine.

He was also fired from his job at the Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Mass. after an internal audit there found that Dr. Reuben had been faking research data for 13 years. (http://www.theday.com/article/20100...)
Business as usual in Big Pharma
What's notable about this story is not the fact that a medical researcher faked clinical trials for the pharmaceutical industry. It's not the fact that so-called "scientific" medical journals published his fabricated studies. It's not even the fact that the drug companies paid this quack close to half a million dollars while he kept on pumping out fabricated research.

The real story here is that this is business as usual in the pharmaceutical industry.

Dr. Reuben's actions really aren't that extraordinary. Drug companies bribe researchers and doctors as a routine matter. Medical journals routinely publish false, fraudulent studies. FDA panel members regularly rely on falsified research in making their drug approval decisions, and the mainstream media regularly quotes falsified research in reporting the news.

Fraudulent research, in other words, is widespread in modern medicine. The pharmaceutical industry couldn't operate without it, actually. It is falsified research that gives the industry its best marketing claims and strongest FDA approvals. Quacks like Dr Scott Reuben are an important part of the pharmaceutical profit machine because without falsified research, bribery and corruption, the industry would have very little research at all.

Pay special attention to the fact that the Anesthesia & Analgesia medical journal gladly published Dr. Reuben's faked studies even though this journal claims to be a "scientific" medical journal based on peer review. Funny, isn't it, how such a scientific medical journal gladly publishes fraudulent research with data that was simply invented by the study author. Perhaps these medical journals should be moved out of the non-fiction section of university libraries and placed under science fiction.

Remember, too, that all the proponents of pharmaceuticals, vaccines and mammograms ignorantly claim that their conventional medicine is all based on "good science." It's all scientific and trustworthy, they claim, while accusing alternative medicine of being "woo woo" wishful thinking and non-scientific hype. Perhaps they should have a quick look in the mirror and realize it is their own system of quack medicine that's based largely on fraudulent research, bribery and corruption.

You just have to laugh, actually, when you hear pushers of vaccines and pharmaceuticals claim their medicine is "scientific" while natural medicine is "unproven." Sure it's scientific -- about as scientific as the storyline in a Scooby Doo cartoon, or as credible as the medical license of a six-year-old kid who just received a "let's play doctor" gift set for Christmas. Many pharmaceutical researchers would have better careers as writers of fiction novels rather than scientific papers.

For all those people who ignorantly claim that modern pharmaceutical science is based on "scientific evidence," just give them these three words: Doctor Scott Reuben.
Drug companies support fraudulent research
Don't forget that the drug companies openly supported Dr. Scott Reuben's research. They paid him, in fact, to keep on fabricating studies.

The drug companies claim to be innocent in all this, but behind the scenes they had to have known what was going on. Dr. Reuben's research was just too consistently favorable to drug company interests to be scientifically legitimate. If a drug company wanted to "prove" that their drug was good for some new application, all they had to do was ask Dr. Reuben to come up with the research (wink wink). "Here's another fifty thousand dollars to study whether our drug is good for post-surgical pain (wink)."

And before long, Dr. Reuben would magically materialize a brand new study that just happened to "prove" exactly what the sponsoring drug company wanted to prove. Advocates of western medicine claim they don't believe in magic, but when it comes to clinical trials, they actually do: All the results they wish to see just magically appear as long as the right researcher gets paid to materialize the results out of thin air, much like waving a magician's wand and chanting, "Abra cadabra... let there be RESEARCH DATA!"

Shazam! The research data materializes just like that. It all gets written up into a "scientific" paper that also magically gets published in medical journals that fail to ask a single question that might exposed the research fraud.

I guess these people believe in magic after all, huh? Where science is lacking, a little "research magic" conveniently fills the void.

The whole system makes a mockery of real science. It is a system operated by criminals who fabricate whatever "scientific evidence" they need in order to get published in medical journals and win FDA approval for drugs that they fully realize are killing people.
What is "Evidence-Based Medicine?"
The fact that a researcher like Dr. Reuben could so successfully fabricate fraudulent study data, then get it published in peer-reviewed science journals, and get away with it for 13 years sheds all kinds of new light on what's really behind "evidence-based medicine."

The recipe for evidence-based medicine is quite simple: Fabricate the evidence! Get it published in any mainstream medical journal. Then you can quote the fabricated evidence as "fact!"

When pushers of pharmaceuticals and vaccines resort to quoting "evidence-based medicine" as their defense, keep in mind that much of their so-called evidence has been entirely fabricated. When they claim their branch of toxic chemical medicine is based on "real science," what they really mean is that it's based on fraudulent science but they've all secretly agreed to call it "real science." When they claim to have "scientific facts" supporting their position, what they really mean is that those "facts" were fabricated by criminal researchers being paid bribes by the drug companies.

"Evidence-based medicine," it turns out, hardly exists anymore. And even if it does, how do you know which studies are real vs. which ones were fabricated? If a trusted, well-paid researcher can get his falsified papers published for 13 years in top-notch science journals -- without getting caught by his peers -- then what does that say about the credibility of the entire peer-review science paper publishing process?

Here's what is says: "Scientific medicine" is a total fraud.

And this fraud isn't limited to Dr Scott Reuben, either. Remember: he engaged in routine research fraud for 13 yearsbefore being caught. There are probably thousands of other scientists engaged in similar research fraud right now who haven't yet been caught in the act. Their fraudulent research papers have no doubt already been published in "scientific" medical journals. They've been quoted in the popular press. They've been relied on by FDA decision makers to approve drugs as "safe and effective" for widespread use.

And yet underneath all this, there's nothing more than fraud and quackery. Sure, there may be some legitimate studies mixed in with all the fraud, but how can we tell the difference?

How are we to trust this system that claims to have a monopoly on scientific truth but in reality is a front for outright scientific fraud?
Keep up the great work, Dr Reuben
Thank you, Dr Scott Reuben, for showing us the truth about the pharmaceutical industry, the research quackery, the laughable "scientific" journals and the bribery and corruption that characterizes the pharmaceutical industry today. You have done more to shed light on the true nature of the drug industry than a thousand articles on we ever could.

Keep up the good work. After paying your fine and serving a little jail time, I'm sure your services will be in high demand at all the top drug companies that need yet more "scientific" studies to be fabricated and submitted to the medical journals.

You may be a dishonest, disgusting human being to most of the world, but you're a huge asset to the pharmaceutical industry and they need you back! There are more studies that need to be fabricated soon; more false papers that need to be published and more dangerous drugs that need to receive FDA approval. Hurry!

Because if there's one place that extreme dishonesty is richly rewarded, it's in the pharmaceutical industry, where poisons are approved as medicines and fiction is published as the truth.

Sources for this story include:
http://www.nbcconnecticut.com/news/...

http://blogs.wsj.com/health/2010/01...

http://www.medpagetoday.com/PublicH...

http://www.theday.com/article/20100...

• On the good news side of things, fish oil supplements have been proven to prevent psychotic disorders:

Mental illness breakthrough: fish oil prevents psychotic disorders
Thursday, February 18, 2010 by: S. L. Baker, features writer

We have already reported on the amazing array of health advantages linked to a diet rich in omega-3 fatty acids, a "healthy" fat found in certain foods such as salmon and walnuts. For example, researchers have documented that omega-3s can help prevent heart arrhythmias and treat depression (http://www.naturalnews.com/027285_o...). These fatty aacids also appear to have an antiaging effect on cells (http://www.naturalnews.com/028046_o...). Get ready to add another remarkable benefit to the list of omega-3 benefits: now scientists have found fish oil supplements containing omega-3s may stop people at high risk for severe mental illness from becoming psychotic.

Psychotic disorders such as schizophrenia are devastating forms of mental problems in which people lose contact with reality and can end up, in worst case scenarios, hurting themselves and others. According to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), a psychosis is usually characterized by delusions and seeing or hearing things that aren't there (hallucinations). The treatment is primarily heavy duty, side effect riddled psychiatric drugs and/or institutionalization.

But what if people a high risk for this mental illness could be prevented from having a psychotic disorder in the first place? That may be possible, thanks to omega-3 fatty acids.
Omega-3s prevent psychotic disorders
According to a report just published in the February issue ofArchives of General Psychiatry, people at extremely high risk of developing a psychosis were found to be less likely to develop psychotic disorders after just 12 weeks of taking fish oil capsules containing omega-3 fatty acids. The study authors pointed out that omega-3 supplementation may be effective because individuals with schizophrenia have an underlying dysfunction in fatty acid metabolism.

"Early treatment in schizophrenia and other psychoses has been linked to better outcomes...intervention in at-risk individuals holds the promise of even better outcomes, with the potential to prevent full-blown psychotic disorders," the authors wrote in their article.

G. Paul Amminger, M.D., of the Medical University of Vienna, Austria, and Orygen Youth Health Research Center in Melbourne, Australia, headed a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial to test whether omega-3s could influence the risk of progression to psychosis in 81 individuals considered to be at extremely high risk for the disorder. The research subjects had displayed a decrease in their ability to function and they also had already developed mild psychotic symptoms, transient psychotic episodes and/or they had a family history of psychotic disorders. Those criteria, the researchers stated in their study, are used to identify individuals whose risk of becoming psychotic may be as high as 40 percent over the course of a year.

For about three months, 41 of the research subjects were given daily fish oil capsules containing 1.2 grams of omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids. The other 40 participants were given a placebo. When the study ended, about 94 percent of the subjects were still in the study and two taking the omega-3s, or only 4.9 percent, had developed a psychotic disorder. On the other hand, 11 in the placebo group (27.5 percent) had become psychotic. The difference between the two groups was extraordinary -- 22.6 percent.

What's more, supplementation with the fatty acids significantly reduced mental illness symptoms and improved overall functioning, too. Not surprisingly, there were virtually no side effects associated with the fish oil pills.

"The finding that treatment with a natural substance may prevent or at least delay the onset of psychotic disorder gives hope that there may be alternatives to antipsychotics for the prodromal (early symptomatic) phase. Stigmatization and adverse effects -- which include metabolic changes, sexual dysfunction and weight gain -- associated with the use of antipsychotics are often not acceptable for young people," the scientists wrote in their study. "Long-chain omega-3 fatty polyunsaturated fatty acids reduce the risk of progression to psychotic disorder and may offer a safe and efficacious strategy for indicated prevention in young people with subthreshold psychotic states."

For more information:
http://archpsyc.ama-assn.org/cgi/co...
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/...


• Are women being conned about breast cancer screening?
•
Women being conned about breast cancer screening
Thursday, February 18, 2010 by: Ethan A. Huff, staff writer
Western medicine relies heavily on convincing people that they need some sort of drug or surgery to remedy their ills and gain health. Studies often contain manipulated facts and skewed statistics that paint a favorable picture of some new procedure or treatment while shrouding the truth about the risks involved. The alleged benefits of breast cancer screenings are no exception as women are continually tricked into believing that mammograms will greatly benefit them when the facts show that they are largely ineffective.

Using an approach called mismatched framing, cancer studies will present side effects in absolute terms while exaggerating benefits in relative terms. When two different metric systems are used to present one set of findings, the results are deceptive albeit technically true.

One statistic says that regular breast cancer screenings reduce the number of breast cancer deaths by 25 percent. While this sounds like a large amount, the truth of the matter is that out of every 1,000 women who get regularly screened, only one extra life would be saved. Apart from screening, four out every 1,000 women will die from breast cancer; with screening, only three would die. The reduction from four to three represents the 25 percent statistic.

However the other half of the story is that 20 percent of those 1,000 women who get screened will be unnecessarily treated with surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy. Up to 500 of them will undergo a needless biopsy due to an inaccurate screening. These monumental risks are never mentioned alongside the glowing endorsements that deceptively use the 25 percent reduction figure to lure women into continuing with screenings.

Drug behemoth Pfizer did the same thing with its Lipitor drug, claiming that those with multiple risk factors who take it will be 36 percent less likely to have a heart attack. When evaluated in absolute terms, two out of every 100 people who take Lipitor will have a heart attack; three out of every 100 people who do not take Lipitor will have a heart attack. The absolute increase in negative side effects among those who take Lipitor versus those who do not is not mentioned in context with the 36 percent reduction claim.

A study conducted by BMJ, the Journal of the American Medical Association, and The Lancet found that about 33 percent of papers published in medical journals fail to use consistent metrics when presenting study findings. The result is a misrepresentation of the truth by the illness industry, drug companies, and the doctors and journalists who aid them in their deception.

Sources for this story include: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/a...
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