Vaccine Studies: Under the Influence of Pharma
http://articles.mercola.com//sites/arti ... harma.aspx
By Barbara Loe Fisher
How Big Pharma Influences Medical Journals
A recent study published in the British Medical Journal reveals the
clout that Big Pharma has in the world of medicine journal publishing,
specifically the publishing of scientific articles about vaccines. In a
Cochrane Collaboration review and analysis of published influenza
vaccine studies found that influenza vaccine studies sponsored by
industry are treated more favorably by medical journals even when the
studies are of poor quality.
This analysis confirms that drug companies marketing vaccines have a
major influence on what gets published and is said about vaccines in
medical journals. It is no wonder that there are almost no studies
published in the medical literature that call into question vaccine
safety.
The preferential treatment of Pharma-funded studies also explains why
the risks of an inappropriately fast-tracked vaccine like Gardasil are
underplayed in the medical literature and why a physician like Andrew
Wakefield, M.D. who dared to publish a study in 1998 in a medical
journal (The Lancet) calling for more scientific investigation into the
possible link between MMR vaccine and regressive autism, has been
mercilessly persecuted for more than a decade, by both Pharma-funded
special interest groups, as well as public health officials maintaining
close relationships with vaccine manufacturers.
Study Finds No Correlation Between Quality of Study and Publication
This recent review identified and assessed 274 published studies on
influenza vaccines for their methodological quality and found no
relationship between study quality, publication in prestige journals or
their subsequent citation in other articles.
The researchers also found that most influenza vaccine studies are of
poor quality but those with conclusions favorable to influenza
vaccinations are of significantly lower methodological quality. The
single most important factor determining where the studies were
published or how much they were cited was sponsorship, with those
partially or wholly funded by the pharmaceutical industry having higher
visibility.
The authors commented: "The study shows that one of the levers for
accessing prestige journals is the financial size of your sponsor.
Pharma sponsors order many reprints of studies supporting their
products, often with in house translations into many languages. They
also purchase advertising space in the journal. Many publishers openly
advertise these services on their website. It is time journals made a
full disclosure of their sources of funding".
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