IT’S A SHAME THAT SICK PEOPLE CAN NO LONGER BE SURE WHO TO TRUST
Financial Conflicts of Interest
Just a few days ago, the current issue of JAMA Oncology published a study called Financial Conflicts of Interest Among Oncologist Authors of Reports of Clinical Drug Trials. It’s yet another example of why EVIDENCE-BASED MEDICINE should be renamed since it’s not nearly as “evidence-based” as John Q Public has been led to believe. Although pharmaceutical payments to researchers are supposed to be reported in the research itself (there is a specific area in all studies — usually near the end of the study — where authors either say “I have no competing interests to declare,” or they list their financial conflicts of interest and competing interests), it turns out that they frequently are not.
Why would the source of a study’s funding be of interest to the public; especially the part of the public who is either fighting cancer themselves, or watching a friend or loved one fight? It’s not hard to figure out. With only so many public dollars (tax dollars) to go around, scientists and biomedical researchers are viciously competing for funding from industry itself. If you click the previous link and start thumbing titles of the dozens of blog posts filed under this category, you quickly see just how poorly this relationship is working out for the consumer (unfortunately, it’s working out great for researchers and for pharma).
Operating under the conclusions of HUNDREDS OF PREVIOUS STUDIES (“In medical research, financial conflicts of interest (FCOI) may affect the conduct and reporting of clinical trials“), the authors, from medical universities in Oklahoma, Oregon, and Texas, showed that firstly, there were significant financial conflicts of interest in a large percentage of CANCER studies from six of the world’s most prestigious oncology journals. And secondly, when you see just how significant these conflicts were, you’ll start to understand how one’s “interests” could easily become “conflicted”. After tallying payments from industry, the authors checked to see whether said payments had been reported to an organization-gone-rogue itself —- the FDA.
Here are a couple of cherry-picked sentences that essentially sum up the team’s findings. “344 oncologist authors from 43 published trials were included in the study. Cumulatively, the 344 oncologist authors received a total of $216,627,353.” Using their figures and not putting pencil and paper to it myself, that works out to $164,644 per person that was not disclosed. I would say that this is a pretty good gig when you can get it. And how, pray tell, do you think you might get hired in the first place? For starters, you’ll have to be a ‘team player’. This is what happens when everyone is on the same team, coming to identical conclusions (HERE).
What’s the point? The point is that, as I have shown you in the past (HERE is a great example specifically using cancer research) that since the evidence cannot be trusted, who are you going to trust? I would argue that no matter how you decide to treat your cancer, the one person you can trust is you. The caveat is that you’ll have to do due diligence. In other words, you are going to have to do some serious studying and research on your own. Let me give you an utterly simple example, whether you decide to treat with chemo and radiation or decide to treat without chemo and radiation.
Even though the heaviest of the heavy hitters in American cancer treatment (Mayo, MD Anderson and Johns Hopkins) have gone out of their way to tell the public that sugar does not feed or contribute to cancer (HERE), a Nobel prize winning scientist led the charge in this area, revealing that we’ve known just this for almost 90 years. For the better part of the past century, science has shown us time and time again that sugar feeds / fuels cancer (HERE, HERE, HERE, and HERE) like a rocket-fueled jet engine.
Furthermore, there are individuals getting great results by pumping their lymphatic system (an important part of the immune system) using gentle rebounding on a TRAMPOLINE. And while I certainly agree that dealing with cancer will necessitate more than my simple GENERIC PROTOCOL for returning to health, it’s a starting point. If you know people who have way too much faith in the medical system and not enough faith in the human body’s inborn ability to heal and repair itself, be sure to get this message in front of them. One of the easiest ways to reach those you love and care about most is by liking, sharing, or following on FACEBOOK.
