Intended for healthcare professionals

Editor's Choice

Moments of truth

BMJ 2010; 340 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.c2042 (Published 15 April 2010) Cite this as: BMJ 2010;340:c2042
  1. Jane Smith, deputy editor, BMJ
  1. jsmith{at}bmj.com

    The “ethics” strand that runs through this week’s BMJ starts with Nicholas Wright’s editorial on whether or not autistic enterocolitis is a real condition (doi:10.1136/bmj.c1807). He is commenting on Brian Deer’s dissection of the histopathological findings in the now-retracted Lancet paper on autism and the MMR vaccine (doi:10.1136/bmj.c1127). With the paper discredited and the original biopsy specimens not available, Wright concludes that it is hard to tell whether the condition exists: he relies on time to resolve the question, but he also reminds us that coauthorship “means bearing responsibility for what is written.”

    Silvio Garattini and Vittorio Bertele’ think that responsibility and accountability in drug regulation are best fostered by transparency, and they argue in their Analysis article that the move of the European Medicines Agency from the EU’s Industry Directorate …

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