E-drug: American research without a requirement for American IRB review (cont)
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I agree that it is disingenuous to expect developing countries
voluntarily to follow Western standards of ethics in regard to
clinical trials. And while I accept that it is preferable that such
standards exist, I'm not sure that I understand why these must be
enforced by a West which continues to ignore (even often support) the
corruption which is frequently an underlying cause of this cavalier
attitude to ethics in the developing world.
It seems to me that there's an awful lot that's being unsaid in these
discussions. Yes, one reason that clinical trials are carried out in the
developing world is because it's 'easier' to do them there. It's probably
also cheaper because you don't have to pay the staff as much. Some
will probably say this is unethical, and call for the staff to be
paid US
salaries. Add all this political correctness, and we'll never see trials
carried out in the conditions in which the drugs need to be used.
I personally find it far, far more unethical that so much money is being
spent developing and marketing 'non-essential' drugs for the West,
while new drugs to treat developing country illnesses are being
ignored. The system clearly provides little incentive for development
of such drugs. Making it almost impossible to test them only adds to
the barriers.
I'm only an ordinary human being, not an ethicist. But it seems to me
better to give one out of two people a possible cure or temporary
alleviation for his/her illness, rather than deny it to both. I'm sure
I'll be told I'm missing several hundred points here, but then, so are
many millions of desperate people in the developing world.
Chris
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Chris W. Green (chrisg@rad.net.id)
Jakarta, Indonesia
Tel: +62-21 846-3029 Fax: +62-21 846-1247
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