Jay D. Amsterdam: The Paroxetine 352 Bipolar Study Ethical Conduct

Kenneth Jaffe’s comment

        Jay Amsterdam, now Emeritus Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania and esteemed psychopharmacology researcher, has been a good friend since our days together as medical students 50 years ago. I have closely followed the story of the Paroxetine 352 case. I commend Dr. Tom Ban and INHN for providing an important service to both our profession and the public by exposing, in meticulously documented detail, this sordid story.

        I wish this was a rare case of Big Pharma's money and power corrupting clinical research and in so doing corrupting an academic institution and likely harming patients. It is not. Instead, it is an unusually well documented example of a common practice that has been going on for many years and reached into many, perhaps most, prestigious academic institutions

        The most wide-spread and deadly recent example of this practice is the prescription opiate epidemic. It was built on a big lie that OxyContin was less addictive than older opiates. This lie was sold to doctors. Far too many chose to buy it and were hardly blameless in the process. Lots of political contributions from Pharma also likely played a big role in the DEA and other federal regulatory agencies turning a blind eye to the prescription opiate epidemic until it exploded in the media and could no longer be ignored. Sadly, corruption is as old as civilization.

"Nothing is so strongly fortified that it cannot be taken by money."

Marcus Tullius Cicero

January 27, 2022