Drug companies' fake medical journals

"Last week, we learned about Elsevier publishing a bogus journal for Merck. Now, several librarians say that they have uncovered an entire imprint of 'advertorial' publications. Excerpta Medica, a 'strategic medical communications agency,' is an Elsevier division. Along with the now infamous Australasian Journal of Bone and Joint Medicine, it published a number of other 'journals.' Elsevier CEO Michael Hansen now admits that at least six fake journals were published for pharmaceutical companies."   http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/05/09/1514235&from=rss   Don't get me wrong, this isn't some greenie or leftie "stop the modern world, I want to get off" dig at "evil" pharmaceutical companies.   Many of us wouldn't even be alive today if it wasn't for them. We forget how many people have been saved by antibiotics and vaccines, especially in childhood.   But this kind of thing is simply unethical, dishonest and only further weakens the already shaky edifice of peer review, as well as confidence in the industry itself.

Posted via email from Garth's posterous