Yet again, two US drug companies are trying to reintroduce secrecy. Merck and PTC Therapeutics have appealed an initial ruling that clinical study reports should not be considered confidential. On 11 September, Advocate General of the European Court of Justice, Gerard Hogan, found that disclosure of the documents would harm the companies’ commercial interests. The […]

… it was because Professor Gøtzsche was prepared to call out the lowering of scientific standards in Cochrane that the hierarchy felt compelled to plot his demise …  one of the worst show trials ever … in a manner that mirrors how the drug industry operates … the death of Cochrane rather than the whistleblower.

By Maryanne Demasi, Ph.D. August 19, 2019. Science is facing a crisis of democracy. Now more than ever, vitriolic attacks are being leveled at people who debate opposing scientific views. Asking questions that challenge the establishment may be unsettling, but silencing debate and proclaiming that the “science is settled” is not the solution. Belgian physician

Sponsored by the Uppsala Monitoring Centre and co-arranged by the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine in Oxford, 34 invited people participated in a three-day workshop, “Improving the detection, analysis and reporting of harms in medicines: exploring, enhancing and empowering.” It has been shown in several independent studies that prescription drugs are the third leading cause of