Last year, the film based on the book by John Le Carré, The constant gardner, had told a mystery story of unethical experimentation in Kenya of a drug against TB: clinical trials of an imaginary unscrupulous pharmaceutical multinational. From fiction to reality, now, with the investigative book by American journalist Sonia Shah, The body hunters, whose subtitle tells its substance: "Testing new drugs on the World's poorest", testing new drugs on the world's poorest. The preface to the essay just released in the US is by John Le Carré, who shares the author's conclusions on the difficulty "of trusting the pharmaceutical industries (and many morally ambiguous scientists) who work for them".
In recent decades questionable research protocols have been denounced as contrary to the recently revised rules of the Declaration of Helsinki, an international document on the ethics of experimentation. It happens more and more often that in Third World countries, writes Shah, drugs are being tested for which there is no market in those countries.
The reasons? Some are economic: clinical trials cost less in countries where wages and living costs are lower. Others are scientific. The "volunteers" who participate in the studies are less exposed to other drugs; people are easier to recruit especially when generous rewards are offered for participation.
A system subject to abuse which has been much debated since the mid-nineties in scientific journals and more recently the target of investigative journalism. The globalization of drug research and development, Shah writes, should also lead to a globalization of bioethics.
The pharmaceutical industry is in crisis: few new active ingredients are put on the market, and most of them are not for the most common diseases in poor countries. Market pressure will only make matters worse. International rules are not enough if the possibility that they are not respected is not built at the local level.
In recent decades questionable research protocols have been denounced as contrary to the recently revised rules of the Declaration of Helsinki, an international document on the ethics of experimentation. It happens more and more often that in Third World countries, writes Shah, drugs are being tested for which there is no market in those countries.
The reasons? Some are economic: clinical trials cost less in countries where wages and living costs are lower. Others are scientific. The "volunteers" who participate in the studies are less exposed to other drugs; people are easier to recruit especially when generous rewards are offered for participation.
A system subject to abuse which has been much debated since the mid-nineties in scientific journals and more recently the target of investigative journalism. The globalization of drug research and development, Shah writes, should also lead to a globalization of bioethics.
The pharmaceutical industry is in crisis: few new active ingredients are put on the market, and most of them are not for the most common diseases in poor countries. Market pressure will only make matters worse. International rules are not enough if the possibility that they are not respected is not built at the local level.
From “www.panorama.it”
