“Hyped” papers by disgraced Karolinska surgeon should be retracted, says ethics board

Sweden’s top ethical review board has called for six papers published by the disgraced surgeon Paolo Macchiarini to be retracted.

They include a key 2011 paper published in the Lancet in which Macchiarini and colleagues claimed success in transplanting an artificial trachea seeded with the patient’s own cells into a 36 year old man.1 The operation took place at the Karolinska University Hospital in Stockholm.

Since doubts first emerged about Macchiarini’s work, a series of reviews has been carried out.23 At first the Karolinska Institute, which employed him, declined to accept that there was evidence of misconduct but was …