Monday’s post explored how Big Pharma ghostwrites articles for doctors to promote their drugs. Universities, the AMA — they’re all basically do what they can to avoid seriously dealing with this crisis in medical ethics. Guess who’s decided to step in? Senator Charles Obama-wants-death-panels, “the government is a predator not a competitor” Grassley.
Grassley recently sent a letter to National Institute of Health saying they need to crack down. Why is Grassley putting pressure on the NIH as opposed to, say, lobbying the AMA? As the New York Times explains,
That is significant because the N.I.H., a federal agency in Bethesda, Md., underwrites much of the country’s medical research. Many of the nation’s top doctors depend on federal grants to support their work, and attaching fresh conditions to those grants could be a powerful lever for enforcing new ethical guidelines on the universities.
In other words, Grassley wants to the power of Big Predator Government to distort the market — and, one assumes, destroy freedom. Senator, feel free to send your next corporate donation here.
