Showing posts with label Bullying of patients. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bullying of patients. Show all posts

Thursday, April 03, 2008

Has GlaxoSmithKline bitten off more than it can chew? - bloggers weigh in over intimidation

Bob Fiddaman has now posted the intimidatory letter he received from GlaxoSmithKline over a video in which he discussed aspects of GSK's science. The comparisons Fiddaman drew elsewhere (not in the video) between a GSK employee and a) Hitler b) faeces are inappropriate. Fiddaman agrees and has apologized over that aspect. One is left wondering who has caused the greater offence, who owes the apology, and to whom that apology is owed. The scientific questions are overwhelming, and the intimidation of a questioning patient cannot be allowed to divert attention from the lack of any real answering.

Dr Alastair Benbow of GSK does have some serious answering to do. He has to explain in detail why public comments he made were truthful (or otherwise). If not truthful, he has to explain whether he lied, was duped by his employer, or whether he failed to examine the facts before making public statements. He has to respond in detail both as a scientist and as a medical doctor. And he has to respond in public. It is inappropriate for a public scientific figure to claim harassment when asked to justify crucial (and potentially lethal) public scientific statements that he made.

More and more decent people out there are linking in to this story. That’s a great show of solidarity against completely inappropriate action by a corporate bully that hasn't even begun to address the scientific questions it has been asked. Here is a primer to some of those questions. There are many others.

Bloggers discussing the intimidation of a patient, Bob Fiddaman, by GlaxoSmithKline
Please let me know if anybody has any more links and we’ll add them in.

I encourage you to spread the links to those blogs discussing this threat to Fiddaman. To make life a little easier, here’s some cut and paste code which I’ll also keep updated. Stick it in your blog post and the list will appear (just drag through and select all the text in the box from the start to the end of the scrollbox, right click and copy to the clipboard, and then post into your blog post after your own comments).



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Tuesday, April 01, 2008

It's Groundhog Day for bullying by GlaxoSmithKline over Seroxat

It seems that attorneys representing GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) in the UK have sent a letter threatening a patient (Bob Fiddaman). Fiddaman writes the "Seroxat (Paxil) Sufferers blog". As a result of the letter, Fiddaman felt intimidated to remove a video he created and posted to his website in February.

Here is a link to the Fiddaman Video which is now hosted on U-Tube.



As doctors we sell our services and the products of industry under the banner of science. The leadership of our profession has long colluded with industry to silence those who draw attention to dishonest science. Although much criticism of medicine is ill-founded, many critics strike at the core of what we do. Their questions are about science. Many of those critics are our patients. They question the quality, transparency and honesty of our science, and they do so with good reason. We ignore these patients and these questions at our peril. That such patients should be threatened is a disgrace.

GSK stand accused of conducting some fairly disreputable science. The particular questions Fiddaman has been asking in his blog relate to a particular medical employee of GSK, Dr Alastair Benbow. The attorneys apparently complained to Fiddaman that Benbow was feeling harassed as a result of the video. They also took umbrage that Fiddaman has implied that Benbow was a liar.

It seems to me that Dr Benbow does indeed have some serious answering to do. He has to explain whether public comments he made were truthful (or otherwise) at the time he made them. If not truthful, he has to explain whether he lied, was duped by his employer, or whether he failed to examine the facts before making crucial public statements. He has to respond both as a scientist and as a medical doctor. And he has to respond in public.

It is not sufficient for a public scientific figure to claim harassment when asked to justify crucial public scientific statements that he made. There is a bit of age-old advice called the Second Rule of Holes: "When you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is to stop digging." In other words, don't let your ghostwriters draft your obituary.

Some of the questions Benbow has to answer are in the Glenmullen report. There are many other questions. Read Fiddamans blog, or other excellent blogs about the failure of science involving SSRI's written by questioning patients or patient representatives (Seroxat Secrets, Furious Seasons, AHRP, Matt Holford). Those very same questions are being asked by psychiatrists and psychologists (Clin Psych, Carlat).

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