CSM takes small step towards openness

The Committee on Safety of Medicines is to publish edited minutes of its meetings on its website, including details of any members who declared links with pharmaceutical companies. Its decision to adopt a more open approach to the public follows a ruling by Michael Buckley, the health service ombudsman, in August.

The committee is one of the independent advisory bodies that give advice to the Medicines Control Agency on whether a particular drug should receive a licence in the United Kingdom.

The ombudsman's ruling resulted from a complaint made by Charles Medawar, director of the consumer lobby group Social Audit, who had asked the committee for information which he said should have been made available to him under the government's Code of Practice on Access to Government Information. …