Biomedical researchers will now have to demonstrate that they--and not an industry or government funder--control data from a study in order to get the results published in some of the world's most prominent medical journals.
The editors of 11 major journals this week issued a joint vow to reject studies in which the sponsor was allowed to manipulate or withhold results. Researchers say that the move will help discourage drug companies from trying to tweak or cover up results that don't support their financial interests.
The journals will now "routinely require authors to disclose details of their own and the sponsor's role in the study." The guidelines do allow sponsors to ask for time--30 to 60 days--to review a manuscript before it is submitted. Signers included the editors of The New England Journal of Medicine, The Lancet, The Journal of the American Medical Association, and leading journals in Denmark, Canada, Australia, the Netherlands, and New Zealand.
The Washington, D.C.-based Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America endorsed the move. Sheldon Krimsky, a public health professor at Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts, who has sounded the alarm about conflicts of interest in science, calls it "a bold step forward by a small but important group of journals."
