The FDA is stocking its new tobacco advisory committee with highly-paid consultants for drug companies that market smoking cessation products. It’s a clear conflict of interest, and equally clear evidence of the federal agency being tone deaf – while other parts of the government and virtually every medical journal worldwide are acknowledging they’ve been wrong to let drug-company-paid “experts” sit on research review panels, here the FDA is tossing fairness right out the window.
A non-profit watchdog, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, is petitioning to toss two foxes out of the henhouse:
· Dr. Neal L. Benowitz consults for Pfizer, makers of Chantix, a prescription pill that aims at nicotine receptors in the brain.
· Jack E. Henningfield is a vice president at Pinney Associates, a consultant for GlaxoSmithKline, maker of nicotine gum, lozenges and patches.
“Everybody hates the tobacco companies, but favoring the drug companies can’t be the answer,” Melanie Sloan, executive director of the watchdog group. Their complaint against the stacked advisory panel has been filed with Department of Health & Human Service’s inspector general.
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