• Question: what can be done to stop gsk from publishing false results to drug tests?

    Asked by cmcloughlin to Jack, Tom on 21 Mar 2013.
    • Photo: Tom Branson

      Tom Branson answered on 21 Mar 2013:

      When results are published they go through a process called “peer review”. This means that their work is forst sent out to some other scientists that check the work and see if it makes sense. Then if they are happy with it, it can get published. So hopefully these reviewers would notice any errors or cheating.

      But occaisonally fake data does get through and is published. This is a terrible thing as it ruins the whole process of scientific advances. Sometimes other people try to copy the work and then find out that it is not possible and so there is a big dispute about what is real or not. There have been times when published work has been proved fake and then the authors get in big trouble.

      I doubt that GSK would try to do this as they are such a big company that if anyone found out then they would be in real trouble. But we have to be careful and put in check like peer review to make sure everyones work is good.

    • Photo: Jack Heal

      Jack Heal answered on 21 Mar 2013:

      This is a brilliant question and a really tough one to answer!
      GSK had to pay a huge fine for the false claims they made, and the fine plus the damage to their brand (they lost a lot of respect and trust!) will have hurt them and made them address their policy. However, for a company as big as GSK maybe the $3 billion fine they got isn’t as big as it sounds – because they make so much money anyway.

      The government department in the US which approves drugs for sale is called the FDA. It’s a real problem that the FDA often base their decisions on drug testing which has been done by the company which wants to sell the drug. So GSK will have tested their own drug, which they are really keen to sell so that they can make lots of money (I’m talking maybe billions of dollars!). Do you think these tests sound as fair as they can be?
      It can be accidental that mistakes happen. Sometimes if you really want to succeed with something you end up seeing the results you want to see and overlooking things that you don’t want to see. As scientists we have to try and look out for this as much as possible and make sure that it doesn’t happen, but it’s not always easy!

      Before things are published they are peer-reviewed. This means that other scientists read about the tests and try and spot if something’s been done incorrectly. They don’t have time (or money) to repeat the tests themselves though and so false results can get through the system.

      I think there needs to be better independent testing of drugs, so that someone else tests the drug after the big company has. It’s difficult because the big company may then get to choose who carries out the “independent” test – and if that’s the case then the test isn’t very fair again!
      It’s a very tricky problem. And although many people try their best to make things fair, when there’s so much money involved it’s not always done well.

Comments