Pharma: Drug Maker Accused Of Paying Ghostwriters To Pen Journal Articles

A drug company is accused of paying ghostwriters to write favorable articles about their drugs — even after one drug was shown to raise the risk of cancer.

Drug maker Wyeth paid ghostwriters to write medical journal articles that were favorable to its female hormone replacement therapy drug, according to Congressional letters referenced in an article in the NYT.

Besides the health insurance industry the other industry I truly disdain is Big Phrma (why Naomi Judd? why appear on their website?).

Back to Wyeth:

One article in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology recommended a hormone replacement therapy drug that now carries a cancer risk warning. The article claimed that there was “no definitive evidence” that the drug caused breast cancer.

According to the NYT, the documents show that the drug company executives came up with ideas for the articles, titled them, paid writers to write the manuscripts, “recruited academic authors and identified publications to run the articles — all without disclosing the companies’ roles to journal editors or readers.”

This is right in league with the video news releases that have been done. Unfortunatley this news may not be enough to hurt Wyeth’s profits or its stock price but I sure hope it will.