The director of the National Institutes of Health, Francis S. Collins, is considering making some quick revisions to his long-awaited plan for toughening NIH conflict-of-interest regulations, following a Chronicle article highlighting his agency's handling of one of the most prominent examples of a researcher who failed to fully disclose payments from industry.
The Chronicle reported Monday that Thomas R. Insel, while leading a just-concluded yearlong NIH effort to bolster the agency's policies against financial conflicts of interest, was also working to help the tainted researcher, Charles B. Nemeroff, land a new job at the University of Miami.
Addressing his agency's advisory board Thursday, Dr. Collins said the proposed new rules, which are nearing final implementation, may now need to be changed to ensure that any penalties or sanctions against a researcher remain in effect if the researcher moves to another institution.
Dr. Collins also said that as a result of the revelations in the Chronicle article, the NIH is reviewing its policies on who can participate in the scientific panels that advise the agency regarding which grant applications should be approved for federal financing. Dr. Nemeroff was allowed to remain on those panels even after his employer at the time, Emory University, found in 2008 that he had violated conflict-of-interest rules and responded by barring him from seeking new NIH grants for two years.
Dr. Nemeroff, now a professor and chairman of the department of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Miami, is one of several high-profile doctors found to have given speeches or written articles in medical journals extolling drugs or products made by companies that had paid them money or stock benefits that they did not report to their universities. Yet Dr. Insel, director of the National Institute of Mental Health, helped Dr. Nemeroff secure his new job at Miami by assuring the university that if it hired Dr. Nemeroff, he would be fully eligible for NIH grants. He also affirmed Dr. Nemeroff's continued eligibility to serve on the NIH's grant-review panels, and responded with encouragement after Dr. Nemeroff reported by e-mail that he was making immediate progress at Miami in obtaining new NIH grants.
Dr. Collins acknowledged Thursday he hasn't yet determined whether or how he could carry out some of the changes he has proposed. Although he talked about maintaining sanctions against a researcher who moves to a new institution, the NIH now penalizes only institutions, not individual researchers. In the case of Dr. Nemeroff, the two-year ban on his eligibility for NIH grants was imposed by Emory under pressure from the NIH officials but not through any mandatory system of penalties.
An NIH spokesman had no immediate response on Thursday to the question of whether Dr. Collins retains confidence in Dr. Insel.
Comments
1. busyslinky - June 11, 2010 at 02:54 am
"Dr. Collins also said that as a result of the revelations in the Chronicle article, the NIH is reviewing its policies..."
means....
Damn, they caught us. Quick let's say something to appease the masses. "Blah, Blah, Blah,...new policy...Blah, Blah, Blah...we'll look into it...Blah Blah Blah".
No mention by Mr. Collins of the issue of the article with Mr. Insel and the "minor" issues of conflict of interest and the irony of all the lapsed ethical issues.
2. kalisto2010 - June 11, 2010 at 05:51 am
"An NIH spokesman had no immediate response on Thursday to the question of whether Dr. Collins retains confidence in Dr. Insel".
At this point wether Dr Collins retains confidence in Dr Insel is necessary but not sufficient for the public to trust NIH as the government agency setting directions and the highest standards for research and healthcare of the nation.
Dr Collins is the voice of corporate NIH under normal circumstances. But what we are seeing here with the Nemeroff/Insel saga is an extreme circumstance of obliviousness to what Americans have been going through in the past five years: the consequences of corruption in the social arena including academic medecine. What we need is the entire NIH leadership (leaders of Institutes and Centers) standing up and asking Dr Insel to resign from his position. It is the appropriate option to consider out of respect for the American public and the institution that they represent.
3. optimysticynic - June 11, 2010 at 09:33 am
One consequence of allowing Nemeroff to continue sitting on grant review panels has been giving him carte blanche to punish those who contributed to blowing the whistle on him or have ever questioned his behavior. He has made excellent use of the freedom to do so.
4. davi2665 - June 11, 2010 at 03:23 pm
The sleazy behavior extends from academia, with "the boss of bosses" acting as a shill for drugs he purported to objectively study, all the way to NIH, whose directors are supposed to uphold ethical standards and integrity, particularly with the use of billions of dollars of taxpayer money. Why is Insel allowed to continue to run an organization after helping to grease the skids for his crony to land a new job. And what was U of Miami thinking when it hired a guy who managed to become a recognized scientific figure through his conflict of interest fiasco. Is Miami TRYING to look bad? Do they just have pathetic judgment? Or is the mad rush for greed able to trump all sense of propriety and ethical conduct? The hallowed halls of academia (including NIH) appear to be just as corrupt as our other fine institutions such as banking and wall street.
5. busyslinky - June 13, 2010 at 04:23 am
Davi2665
You ask why, what, how, do they think...etc.
The answer is simple. Because they think they can get away with it, and essentially they are getting away with it.
The follow-up to this story will die unless CHE keeps it alive. Let's hope they have the resources and time to keep investigating and publicizing this issue. It is millions and probably billions of dollars worth of unethical (and probably should be illegal) behavior occurring here.
6. abikant45 - June 13, 2010 at 11:36 am
"and essentially they are getting away with it".... I would not be so pessimistic. Let's wait until Senator Grassley receives a response from UM President. If that investigation shows that Insel had been committed to help Nemeroff evade responsibility for his errors, NIH has no alternative but ask Insel to go. It is their credibility which is at stake, particularly now that NIH has received so many billions of dollars at the expense of postponing some other urgent needs in the country.
7. 1boringoldman - June 14, 2010 at 10:19 am
Charlie Nemeroff does not deserve this much discussion. Collins, Insel, Goldschmidt, and Nemeroff are all in the game, as is Emory for failing to be honest about the depth of Nemeroff's deceit. There's no question about what to do here. The only question is whether to take his cronies down with him. I vote "yes."
8. 1boringoldman - June 14, 2010 at 10:38 am
"Scott Peck discusses evil in his book People of the Lie: The Hope For Healing Human Evil and also in a chapter of The Road Less Traveled. Peck characterizes evil as a malignant type of self-righteousness in which there is an active rather than passive refusal to tolerate imperfection [sin] and its consequent guilt."
In the years of being around and hearing about Dr. Nemeroff in action in Atlanta, I thought more than once about Scott Peck's book [People of the Lie]. Throughout his fall from grace, Charlie has maintained the stance that he just didn't know the rules. Yet in 2004, Emory told him the rules outright, but he continued. Now he's in Miami, still at it.
He is unable to face his "imperfection" or feel "guilt." The current allegations include signing off on ghost-written articles and recommending a drug to pregnant women that puts holes in their baby's hearts. Formerly, all he did was spend gajillions of taxpayer's dollars validating drugs he was paid handsomely to validate by their manufacturers.
In his email to Charlie, Dr. Insel said, "Congrats on the new position! Should be a new beginning." Dr. Nemeroff doesn't need a new beginning. He needs a long overdue ending.