Healthy Skepticism International News
This page lists issues published since 1 January, 2004.
Go to issues published before 1 January, 2004.
May 2008 Vol 26 No 5
By James Alexander.
James writes of his experience as a clinical psychologist wherearound 75% of people referred to him by GPs are on antidepressants, usually SSRIs, and often benzodiazepines or mood stabilizers in addition. The majority of these people present with symptoms which clearly suggest negative side effects.
Apr 2008 Vol 26 No 4
By Joel Lexchin
Professor Lexchin argues that the priorities of Health Canada are skewed in favour of rapid approval of new drugs at the expense of the postmarketing pharmacosurveillance. Adverse drug reactions, even serious ones, are significantly under-reported but mandatory reporting does not seem to improve reporting rates in countries where it has been implemented. He suggests a series of reforms that could be undertaken by Health Canada to significantly improveCanada’s postmarketing pharmacosurveillance system.
Mar 2008 Vol 26 No 3
The ADHD drug Strattera – actions needed now
By Janne Larsson
This article gives updated information about the harmful effects of the ADHD drug Strattera.
Feb 2008 Vol 26 No 2
HPV vaccine: An (unpublished) letter to the editor
By Madeline Boscoe, Abby Lippman, Ellen Reynolds and Anne Rochon Ford
This month's International News draws attention to the work of the Canadian Women's Health Network (CWHN). CWHN was created in 1993 as a voluntary national organization to improve the health and lives of girls and women in Canada and the world by collecting, producing, distributing and sharing knowledge, ideas, education, information, resources, strategies and inspirations.
Jan 2008 Vol 26 No 1
Antidepressants in children
By David Menkes, Peter Mansfield and Jon Jureidini
A meta-analysis in JAMA in April 2007 has led many to conclude that antidepressants are often useful for adolescents. This brief paper raises questions about the merit of that analysis, and in particular its failure to account for methodological problems in the analysed papers.
Nov-Dec 2007 Vol 25 No 11-12
By Donald Ross, PhD
In response to his own experience of adverse events with lipid-lowering drugs, an 85-year old research scientist reflects on why the United States spends the most per capita of any country on health, yet ranks roughly 40th in life expectancy.
Oct 2007 Vol 25 No 10
A response to Tiago Villanueva
By Geoffrey Spurling
Geoff was a GP registrar only a few years ago but is now a part time GP and a Senior Lecturer in the Discipline of General Practice, University of Queensland. He puts a different view about the dilemma discussed by Tiago in the previous issue.
Sep 2007 Vol 25 No 9
Pharma money: the least common denominator
By Tiago Villanueva
Tiago is a Portuguese GP registrar. In this issue he discusses the difficult dilemma for young doctors created when they can access education funded by industry in the absence of government funded education.
Aug 2007 Vol 25 No 8
No issue was published this month
Jul 2007 Vol 25 No 7
Healing schizophrenia : using medication wisely
A book review by David P. Ellis
Jun 2007 Vol 25 No 6
Selling cancer chemotherapy with concessions creates conflicts of interest for oncologists
By Gregory D. Pawelski
A carer's view of the US Chemotherapy Concession.
May 2007 Vol 25 No 5Is it insulting to suggest that health professionals are influenced by drug promotion?
By Peter R Mansfield
One of the most important barriers to healthy skepticism about drug promotion is the belief that to suggest that health professionals are influenced is to insult them. Some arguments for overcoming that barrier are presented in this issue. Peter has found these arguments to be effective for use in presentations to health professionals.
April 2007 Vol 25 No 4
Regulation of Homeopathic Products
By Ken Harvey
Ken questions whether companies are misusing the regulations that govern homeopathic products in Australian in order to market pharmacologically inactive substances labelled as DHEA, HGH and melatonin.
March 2007 Vol 25 No 3
Letter from Novartis re litigation against India’s refusal to grant a patent for imatinib (Glivec / Gleevec)
By: Peter R Mansfield and Joana Ramos
This issue includes an open letter from Novartis, published on request from that company. We also provide a summary of the context.
February 2007 Vol 25 No 2
What everyone needs to know about drug marketing. Part 3: Place, Promotion and Goals
By: Peter R Mansfield
This is the final part of a 3 part article. This part will be easier to understand if you have read the first two first.
January 2007 Vol 25 No 1
What everyone needs to know about drug marketing. Part 2: Prices
By: Peter R Mansfield
This is the second part of a 3 part article. This part will be easier to understand if you have read the first part first.
December 2006 Vol 24 No 12
What everyone needs to know about drug marketing. Part 1: Products
By: Peter R Mansfield
This is first part of a 3 part article and focuses on pharmaceutical products.
November 2006 Vol 24 No 11
What are we doing to our children? / Do we have a prescription addiction?
By: Jerome Burne
A good example of drugs with a poor evidence base - when all the concealed trials are taken into account - is the antidepressant SSRIs (serotonin selective reuptake inhibitors). Their widespread use on children illustrates how drugs are regularly prescribed without any evidence base at all. In 2003 the UK’s drug regulatory authority – the MHRA – ruled that only one SSRI (Prozac) should be used for children,; a very authoritative meta-analysis showed that another four of these drugs did more harm than good to children. The first of these articles reveals that despite this ruling and despite the evidence, UK doctors continued to prescribe the harmful drugs in greater numbers than Prozac. The second story shows that even though total prescribing of SSRIs to children has been falling, the number of the far heavier and more dangerous antipsychotic drugs prescribed to them has risen by 50% in four years.
October 2006 Vol 24 No 10
Don't judge a paper by its abstract
By: Peter Parry
Peter is a consultant child & adolescent psychiatrist who became interested, perplexed and then troubled after closely comparing the abstract of a highly important paper to his clinical practice with the paper’s own results in the body of its text. The paper in question “Fluoxetine, Cognitive-Behavioural Therapy and Their Combination for Adolescents with Depression - Treatment for Adolescents with Depression Study (TADS) Randomised Control Trial” highlights problems in current research and medical publication. Abstracts may reflect bias of the researchers or study sponsors and distort findings of the research.
September 2006 Vol 24 No 9
Pharmaceutical-Based Palliative Care – Looking beyond the Marketing
By: Professor Ian Maddocks AM
Ian believes that "health is a political matter, and is better facilitated by social activity and preventive medicine than by daily clinical activity, though the latter provides excellent awareness of human needs and grass-roots understanding as well as professional credibility." Here we publish a talk given by Ian in Malaysia that he dedicated to Peter Mansfield, who was a student of Ian's.
August 2006 Vol 24 No 8
Introduction to Healthy Skepticism Inc, our reform agenda and methods
By: Peter Mansfield
Peter Mansfield has written a clear and detailed account of the why and how of Healthy Skepticism.
July 2006 Vol 24 No 7
The worst kind of deceit: Fraud by Novartis and Max Foundation targets patients
By: Silvia Garcia. Translated by Chechi Vilasetru and Marta Vigués
An English translation of the feature article “El Peor de los Engaños: Fraude del laboratorio Novartis y la Fundación Max a pacientes” published in the magazine El Medico (No. 191, 30 July 2006) of Buenos Aires.June 2006 Vol 24 No 6
Influences on Oncologists' prescribing of chemotherapy
By:Gregory D. Pawelski
Greg was a spouse/caregiver to an ovarian cancer patient. He became interested in cancer medicine by virtue of working through, enduring and surviving his wife's illness. He says, 'I've gotten a street education by virtue of voluminous reading and hundreds of hours of past and ongoing personal communication with noted authorities in the field.' To paraphrase Martin Luther King Jr.: "A scientific communication should be judged on the quality of its content and only secondarily, or not at all, on the qualifications of its author."
May 2006 Vol 24 No 5
DES & Disease Mongering: "How I started HRT at a very young age"
By: Marian Vickers
The DES story is not only about a pharmaceutical disaster, it also provides a sobering and clear example of disease mongering over the decades. DES was the first cheap synthetic oestrogen developed that was able to be taken orally. What followed was decades of disease mongering: a profitable product in search of an ongoing market.
Apr 2006 Vol 24 No 4
Healthy Skepticism about antidepressants for children and adolescents -an Australian perspective
By: Peter Mansfield, Jon Jureidini, Melissa Raven, and Anne Tonkin
Discussion of the benefits and harms of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) for major depression in children and adolescents has been amongst the most interesting debates in medicine so far this century. This paper presents a chronological summary of recent Australian contributions to the debate from the perspective of Healthy Skepticism Inc.
Mar 2006 Vol 24 No 3
Health Care and the Drug Industry
- Physicians: Prescribing under the influence?
- Patients: Do you feel unmotivated?
- Society: Are there statins in the water?
By: Tim Doty
Tim, a 4th year medical student at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, wrote the following 3-part series of articles as part of a research project completed during his 2nd year medical studies. Part 1 examines personal and professional relationships, as well as the ethics of gift-giving. Part 2 looks at how, through marketing and advertising, patients are made to feel like they need the latest and greatest (and the most expensive) the drug industry has to offer. Part 3 reviews drug industry influence on a societal level; how patents are bolstered and extended; how developing nations are used for drug research.
Click here for a link to Tim's Powerpoint presentation.
Feb 2006 Vol 24 No 2
Duloxetine a serotonin and norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor: Superior to existing SSRIs?
By: Florence Delamarre
A systematic literature search demonstrates that information from published clinical trials does not provide evidence that Duloxetine is more efficient than other SSRIs or that is has a better safety profile than SNRIs. The manufacturer’s claims on superiority for Duloxetine over SSRIs are unwarranted.
What can be done in India?
By: Anant Phadke
Anant Phadke's suggestions for reform in India were used as a background paper for the Drug Action meeting in Mumbai in 2003.
Dec 2005 Vol 23 No 12
Report on consultation with Healthy Skepticism subscribers and members
By: Caroline Saxon
Caroline has spent 3 months liaising with members, subscribers and the management committee to gauge opinion about future directions for Healthy Skepticism. This is the short version of her report. A more detailed account will be posted on this website soon.
Nov 2005 Vol 23 No 11
DES exposed Australians seeking political action
By: Carol Devine
Carol Devine, Coordinator, DES Action Australia-NSW,looks at the poor support offered to individuals whose mothers took DES during pregnancy. Anyone with known or suspected DES exposure or just wanting further information may contact Carol Devine, Phone +612 98754820.
Oct 2005 Vol 23 No 10
SSRI Lawyer Corrects New York Times Report
By: Karen Barth Menzies
The FDA's recent warnings regarding suicidality and SSRI antidepressants were appropriate and long overdue, based on scientific evidence and the FDA's warning responsibilities to consumers as directed by the Code of Federal Regulations. The article published in the New York Times on August 6, 2005 by Gardiner Harris, titled FDA Responds to Criticism with New Caution asserts the erroneous thesis that the FDA simply yielded to criticism and issued invalid warnings, casting a cloud of doubt over the legitimacy of the warnings. That the FDA finally stepped up to shield consumers instead of pharmaceutical companies should be applauded, not undermined with inaccurate reporting. People died as a result of absent warnings while the SSRI antidepressants were marketed and sold as harmless.
Sep 2005 Vol 23 No 9
Submission from Healthy Skepticism re RACP Ethical Guidelines
By: Peter Mansfield, Wendy Rogers and Jon Jureidini
The Royal Australasian College of Physicians (RACP) is the college for medical specialists in Australia and New Zealand. RACP is revising its Ethical Guidelines and invited Healthy Skepticism to make a submission. Peter Mansfield and Jon Jureidini wrote part 1 of our submission. Part 2 was written by medical ethicist and HS member Wendy Rogers. RACP's May 2005 draft Ethical Guidelines are available at: www.racp.edu.au/public/news_ethics.htm
Aug 2005 Vol 23 No 8
Women and the new sexual politics: Profits versus pleasures. Second New View Campaign Conference, Montreal, July , 2005
By: Leonore Tiefer, Ph.D
Table of Contents Introduction. Women’s sexuality: Experts then and now. Lack of appropriate research enables perpetuation of myths. Viagra downsides revealed in study Down Under. Sex, Viagra and the senior woman. Androgens make a Comeback. Valuing oneself. Killing Us Softly: Advertising’s image of women. The hidden hand of Big Pharma. Comprehensive sexuality education vital for youth health. Letting experts manage our lives and feelings. Spreading the New View. A Postscript about New Directions following the Montreal New View Conference.
Jul 2005 Vol 23 No 7
A Planetary Loss. Senator Nelson had more than one string to his bow.
By: Barbara Seaman
Gaylord Anton Nelson Born June 4,1916 in Clear Lake,Wisconsin. Died in Kensington, Maryland, from cardiovascular failure, July 3, 2005, age 89.
Jun 2005 Vol 23 No 6
Book Review: Selling Sickness
By: Ralph Faggotter, GP and Member, Healthy Skepticism management group.
Review of 'Selling Sickness : How the drug companies are turning us all into patients'. Moynihan R and Cassels A, published by Allen and Unwin, 2005.
May 2005 Vol 23 No 5
Submission to Medicines Australia Review of the Code of Conduct
By: Peter R Mansfield, Joel Lexchin, an anonymous source from the pharmaceutical industry, Melissa Raven, Jon Jureidini, Ralph Faggotter and Rosie Burn.
Medicines Australia (MA) is the Australian association for drug companies. MA are reviewing their self-regulatory Code of Conduct and invited many other groups to make submissions. They did not invite Healthy Skepticism to make a submission but when contacted did agree to accept one from us. Our submission has been improved by contributions from an anonymous source from the industry.
Apr 2005 Vol 23 No 4
The new alchemy: Mixing doctors and journalists to spin gold
By: Jeanne Lenzer
Prominent medical journalist, Jeanne Lenzer, has made available to Healthy Skepticism this important piece on the relationship between journalists and pharma.
Mar 2005 Vol 23 No 3
Book Review: Building Global Biobrands
By: Joana Ramos
Review of Françoise Simon and Philip Kotler. Building Global Biobrands: Taking Biotechnology to Market. 2003; New York: Free Press/Simon & Shuster ISBN 0-7432-2244-X
Feb 2005 Vol 23 No 2
Book Review: Overdosed America
By: Jon Jureidini
Review of John Abramson. Overdosed America ‘The broken promise of American Medicine’ 2004; New York: Harper Collins
Jan 2005 Vol 23 No 1
New Definition of “Patient Assistance Program” in Brazil
By: Joana Ramos
Joana Ramos of Seattle is an independent consultant in oncology social work. Also trained as a medical interpreter, she is a former resident of Brazil.
Oct 2004 Vol 22 No 10-12
Healthy Skepticism about drug promotion
By: Peter R Mansfield
Memorandum for the UK House of Commons Health Committee Inquiry: THE INFLUENCE OF THE PHARMACEUTICAL INDUSTRY by Dr Peter R Mansfield on behalf of Healthy Skepticism Inc.
Sep 2004 Vol 22 No 9
Direct-to-consumer advertising: Healthy education or corporate spin?
By: Melissa Raven
Direct-to consumer advertising (DTCA) of prescribed drugs in mass media has recently emerged as a contentious issue internationally. Among industrialised countries, it is currently allowed only in New Zealand and the United States, where industry journals trumpet its effectiveness. Many of the drugs advertised are 'lifestyle drugs' and/or expensive new drugs touted as superior replacements for established drugs. DTCA advocates claim that it provides valuable consumer education about medical conditions and treatments. However, there are many objections, including overstatement of benefits and understatement of risks, escalating drug costs, and undermining of doctor-patient relationships. Although DTCA is not legal in Australia, de facto DTCA does occur in the form of advertisements about specific diseases and conditions and news stories about new drugs. Five case studies are presented to illustrate aspects of DTCA. It is concluded that there is a glaring gap between industry rhetoric and DTCA reality.
Jun 2004 Vol 22 No 6-8
Correspondence about promotion of Cialis at www.erectionproblems.com.au
By: Peter Mansfield, Kieran Schneemann and Heather Jones
This month’s issue features correspondence between Peter Mansfield and Medicines Australia about the www.erectionproblems.com.au website, and possible illegal promotion of Cialis.
May 2004 Vol 22 No 5
Correspondence about the launch of Bristol-Myers Squibb's agency in Sri Lanka.
By: Kris Weerasuriya
This issue consists of the correspondence between Prof Weerasuriya and Bristol-Myers Squibb after Prof Weerasuriya, then Professor of Pharmacology & Secretary, Drug Evaluation Sub-committee, Ministry of Health Sri Lanka noted that a significant number of banners displayed by Bristol-Myers Squibb at the launching of their agency in Sri Lanka violated regulations on pharmaceutical promotion in Sri Lanka, the regulations of the US FDA and the Code of Practice of the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association.
Apr 2004 Vol 22 No 4
Review of recent studies of prescribing by Canadian physicians
By: Joel Lexchin
Jan 2004 Vol 22 No 1-3
Is Psychiatry for sale?
By: Joanna Moncrieff
An examination of the influence of the pharmaceutical industry on academic and practical psychiatry.