Research

US to curtail chimpanzee research after report

Michael Cook | 17 December 2011

Given that chimpanzees are so closely related to us, American researchers should allow them to be used in biomedical research only under stringent conditions, says a report from the Institute of Medicine and National Research Council. These include the absence of any other suitable model and inability to ethically perform the research on people.

Cloning in Korea

Jared Yee | 10 December 2011

The recent past of Korea’s cloning research is best described as dubious. Disgraced Seoul University professor Hwang Woo-suk claimed in 2004 to have cloned human embryos and developed stem-cell lines, but most of that work was exposed as fraud in 2005. Now another scientist, Park Se-pill, of Jeju National University, is aiming to clone human embryonic stem cells by 2015, a breakthrough that scientists still have not yet achieved.

Questions over clinical trials in India

Jared Yee | 24 November 2011

Western pharmaceutical companies have pinpointed India as a prime candidate for outsourcing clinical trials, due to its population and lax regulations, which help slash research costs.

Marketing and science clash in Gardasil debate

Jared Yee | 18 November 2011

Gardasil, Merck’s vaccine against the human papilloma virus, the most common sexually transmitted disease, is once again at the centre of political, moral, bioethical and economic controversy after last month’s recommendation by the Centres for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC) that 11 and 12-year-old boys be vaccinated.

Chimpanzee hepatitis C research in the firing line

Jared Yee | 18 November 2011

Experiments on chimpanzees have often horrified animal rights advocates and worried the medical community.

Patients in vegetative state are often misdiagnosed: study

Jared Yee | 12 November 2011

Patients in a vegetative state have intervals of wakefulness, but seem to be unaware of themselves or their surroundings, a Lancet study has found.

Dutch “Lord of the Data” forged dozens of studies: report

Jared Yee | 04 November 2011

A leading Dutch social psychologist fabricated or manipulated information in dozens of research papers over almost a decade, an investigation has concluded.

Researchers grow vertebrae, colon stem cells

Jared Yee | 16 September 2011

Researchers at UC Davis have used stem cells from adult bone marrow to encourage the growth of bone tissue necessary for spinal fusion following the removal of cervical discs – the cushions between neck bones, alleviating debilitating, chronic pain.

Bioethics commission rules Guatemalan STD research unethical

Jared Yee | 31 August 2011

US researchers violated ethical boundaries when they deliberately infected Guatemalan prisoners, mental health patients and prostitutes with sexually transmitted diseases in a 1940s research project, a presidential commission concluded on Tuesday.

Scientists credited on ghostwritten research “should be charged with fraud”

Jared Yee | 12 August 2011

Doctors and scientists who add their names to medical articles they have not written should be charged with professional misconduct and fraud, Canadian legal experts say.

US proposes rule changes for research on human subjects

Jared Yee | 05 August 2011

The US federal government has proposed sweeping reforms to rules governing scientific research on human subjects.

Call for renewal of bioethics in military

Jared Yee | 22 July 2011

Bioethicist Steven Miles, of the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, has called for a renewal of military medical ethics in the US.

Call for head of US bioethics commission to step down

Jared Yee | 14 July 2011

Corporate governance and management oversight are flavour of the week with the shenanigans at Rupert Murdoch’s defunct News of the World on every front page.

Researchers question research ethics regulation system

Jared Yee | 21 May 2011

Bioethics kills people. This, obviously, is not a conventional view of bioethics. It is supposed to protect and save people. However, an article in the Journal of Internal Medicine contends that ethical regulation for medical research “slows, discourages and stops life-saving research,” and that as a result, “lives are lost that would otherwise have been saved.”

Should last remaining known smallpox virus be destroyed?

Jared Yee | 18 March 2011

Is research more important than public safety?

Is most medical research wrong?

Michael Cook | 31 October 2010

Greek academic finds that between a third and a half of the most acclaimed research in medicine may be untrustworthy