Widespread fraud in the Clinical Trial of Drugs is pervasive event in United States

There have been several cases where Fraud in clinical trial has questioned the  Integrity of Data and ethics , when conducting clinical trial in India, which have been used by crusaders against outsourcing. But the new evidence suggest that the clinical trial fraud is more prevalent even in US. The most recent being MannKind Corporation Accused of Covering Up Adverse Clinical Trial Results

India’s poor history on adhering to patents, strong legal system, and the image of corruption means, any fraud in conducting clinical trial in India will invite serious punishment from FDA and western world. Yes we can cry that we will be singled out , or we can take necessary steps to avoid incidents such as above

MNC pharma MannKind is accused of Data Fraud Coverup  in securing FDA approval for Afrezza the inhaled insulin drug. A senior manager uncovered unlawful clinical trial conduct pertaining to the company’s Afrezza inhalant insulin device.  John Arditi, who was MannKind’s senior director of worldwide regulatory affairs, filed a wrongful termination lawsuit against his former employer, in New Jersey Superior Court, claiming he was unfairly fired by MannKind after internal audits he conducted in November 2009 uncovered “potential fraud and scientific misconduct” involving Afrezza clinical trial data

Arditi discovered discrepancies in data at both a Russian and Bulgarian trial site, according to his lawsuit.  For several months, Adverse event results were either not being recorded properly, or were fabricated to favor the approval of Afrezza.  Arditi’s lawsuit asserts that he informed superiors at MannKind, on November 9, 2009, of his adverse findings and encouraged the company to approach the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) but MannKind did not contact the agency because negative information would delay approval of the New Drug Application (NDA) for Afrezza.

The new revelation on MannKind Afrezza Clinical Trial that emerged last week , comes just days after the report published by The Council for Clinical Research Subject Safety & Data Integrity (CCRSSDI)  on widespread fraud in the Clinical Trial drugs by pharma and CROs in Unites States.

Two time Emmy winning reporter Kathy McDevitt led an investigative team from The Council for Clinical Research Subject Safety & Data Integrity (CCRSSDI), to record Subjects committing fraud. Her investigation led to on-air confessions by two such subjects on the nature and the extent of the fraud in the industry

Ms. McDevitt and CCRSSDI have jointly released a documentary tilted “Pervasive Fraud in the Clinical Trial World” . It is available on the CCRSSDI website. Copies of the DVD may also be requested by the video.

Among the findings in the documentary:

• Multiple simultaneous trial enrollments by Subjects
• Inability of research sites to check for dual clinical trial enrollments
• No single record of all the studies a subject has taken
• Inability to verify amount of actual drug usage by a Subject in a Study
• Potential for flawed results in Studies

Watch the Documentary on YouTube

“I was shocked by how lax the identification process is for potential Study Subjects”, said Kathy McDevitt. “I always had assumed that a thorough identification and verification was required to enroll qualified patients in studies for drugs that you and I take”

Kerri Weingard, the Director of CCRSSDI, further adds “We here at the Council have consistently raised this issue. Many members of this Council run their own Study Sites and we have seen the level of fraud increase year after year. Unfortunately, no steps are being taken by the industry as a whole to combat this problem. If this problem is left unchecked, the whole industry will suffer and public confidence in our Drug Testing process will be fundamentally undermined”

CCRSSDI has led the charge on this issue. Its charter clearly defines that the primary goal of CCRSSDI is to ensure that every study by every site and every sponsor utilizes and identification and verification process to ensure that there is no fraud occurring and that subjects are not dual-enrolled or have been expelled from previous studies.

Download the explosive documentary “Pervasive Fraud in the Clinical Trial World”, at http://www.CouncilForClinicalResearch.com

For further information please contact Kerri Weingard, Director, Council for Clinical Research Subject Safety & Data Integrity at KWeingard(at)CouncilForClinicalResearch(dot)com or 646-225-6624

Council for Clinical Research Subject Safety & Data Integrity is composed of established members of the medical profession. Its goal is to ensure that our testing process for Clinical Research Trials remains error free and that Subject Safety is always assured. meetings are open to all. For further information please email  at info@CouncilForClinicalResearch.com.
ONE of Australia’s most senior cancer specialists has accused pharmaceutical companies of manipulating some clinical trials of medicines for commercial reasons, including deliberately delaying the release of negative findings and being reluctant to fund research into the toxicity of their drugs.  More details

Professor Stephen Clarke, who has conducted clinical trials involving humans for 15 years, agreed to speak publicly for the first time because he said it was essential for governments to fund trials of great public importance rather than leaving critical research solely to drug companies.

A number of researchers who spoke to The Age agreed, saying commercial decisions meant the public did not always get the full picture about a drug’s usefulness and safety.

Other more high profile clinical trial related issues in recent past are PPD Inc responsibility in Ketek Trial for Aventis

The FDA found the fraud 2002 in a trial supervised by PPD, the doctor was indicted 2003, convicted 2004 and Ketek was approved 2004 by the FDA using the faulty data. It wasn’t until early 2006 that liver problems in patients using Ketek came to light and subsequently, the continued reliance on the fraudulent data. Congressional hearings were called for in 2006 which were held 2007 and again 2008 when Fred Eshelman, founder of PPD testified

The FDA and drug maker Aventis were directly faulted. Eshelman washed his hands. . This clip is one of three showing Fred Eshelman’s verbal responses to questions.

Some of the other high profile cases are

News that Schering-Plough, one of the largest drug companies in the world, has been outright bribing physicians to prescribe drugs and operate sham clinical trials http://www.naturalnews.com/001298.html

University of California findings in the October issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine, that 167 placebo-controlled trials published in peer-reviewed medical journals in 2008 and 2009 and found that 92 percent of those trials never even described the ingredients of their placebo pills.

The Utah Attorney General has filed a lawsuit charging GlaxoSmithKline illegally marketed its controversial Avandia diabetes pill as a new “wonder drug” that would reduce cardiovascular risks for diabetes, but instead increased the possibility of heart attacks. Consequently, the AG alleges Glaxo hoodwinked the state Medicaid program out of $7.8 million, which is the amount Utah spent to purchase Avandia between Jan. 1, 2001 and June 30, 2010

The more recent events in India were

Glenmark Pharmaceuticals and Omnicare have closed a clinical trial site in India operated by the contract research organisation (CRO) amid accusations that an investigator acted fraudulently.

Clinical Trial Fraud – How to Identify and Steps to Handle If Found, events like these makes adherence to GCP and training of CRA, and all stake holders in clinical trial more and more important