Editorial

Since we wrote an editorial on the unethical methods of high-jacking hospitals by the drug manufacturers, it has come to light that the malise is more serious. The first sin is that the MNC's and other manufacturers are using Indian laboratories for their testing. The money paid to the professor; is a pittance when compared to the capital needed to build laboratories.

The second most important sin is the testing of their untried medicines on human guinea pigs without their knowledge. The result of all this is that in the three years of trial and testing, 1500 patients had died. There is no compensation equal to the life lost. How could the manufacturers penetrate the hospitals, including the most prestigious ones ?

The professors in charge of clinical research are paid a huge sum by the companies to try their untested medicines. The professors are also members of Ethics committees whose duty is to protect the interests of the patients.

As the same professors are members of ethics committees of other hospitals, they get clearances for their trials from those committees. Taking permission for oneself from oneself has the advantage similar to appointing themselves as external examiners for their students. Here the conclusions are drawn before experimentation. But the principle of Alice in the wonderland "first verdict and then argument" was meant as humour. Our good doctors have taken it seriously.

This is the time for the Indian Medical Council to act fearlessly against the guilty. Our hospitals are not extensions of MNC's, nor our professors, their lab boys, nor our patients their guinea pigs. This is a subtle exploitation by the MNC's and manufacturers. We say HALT to this exploitation.