Did a British university sell out to P&G? - By Jennifer Washburn. Earlier this month, Sheffield University in Britain offered $252,000 to one of its senior medical professors, Aubrey Blumsohn. According to a copy of a proposed settlement released by Blumsohn, the university promised to pay him if he would agree to leave his post and not make "any detrimental or derogatory statements" about Sheffield or its employees. For several years, Blumsohn had been complaining of scientific misconduct. His concerns primarily revolved around a $250,000 research contract between Sheffield and the Ohio-based Procter & Gamble Pharmaceuticals.
Blumsohn claimed that the company had denied him access to key data and then tried to ghostwrite his analysis of it. He further alleged that P&G had engaged in such practices before. Aubrey Blumsohn: Academic who took on industry. Aubrey Blumsohn forfeited his job after going public with concerns about access to Procter and Gamble’s research data on the osteoporosis drug risedronate.
Clare Dyer talks to him about his experience “Scientists since Galileo have realised you can’t be a scientist without data,” observes Aubrey Blumsohn. It seems a statement of the obvious, but he welcomes the General Medical Council’s recognition in the case of Richard Eastell, the former colleague whom he reported to the GMC, that “data” mean raw data, not summary data produced by a drug company’s in-house statistician.1 2 That recognition, he believes, vindicates the stand he took when he fought US based Procter and Gamble (P&G) Pharmaceuticals, which refused him access to the raw data for research Professor Eastell and he were leading on the company’s osteoporosis drug risedronate between 2002 and 2005.
Dr. Aubrey Blumsohn. From WikiLeaks Exposing scientific misconduct by pharmaceutical company.
Blumsohn was employed at Sheffield University as a senior lecturer and honorary consultant in metabolic bone disease. He was engaged on a joint research project with Procter & Gamble Pharmaceutical, which funded the work and had a commercial interest in the outcome. @pharmagossip. Scientific Misconduct Blog. PG.com Home: sustainability, company, brands.