This could very well be the largest research fraud in medical history, as formerly chief of acute pain at Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Mass and a former member of Pfizer's speakers' bureau, has agreed to plead guilty to faking dozens of research studies that were published in medical journals.
Now being reported across the mainstream media is the fact that Dr. Reuben accepted a $75,000 grant from Pfizer to study the effectiveness of Celebrex pain medication in a 2005 study in which no patients were actually enrolled in 2005.
Prosecutors allege that Reuben made up the data, which he subsequently published in the medical journal 'Anesthesia and Analgesia', and has since been quoted by hundreds of other doctors and researchers as "proof" that Celebrex reduces pain during post-surgical recovery.
Dr. Scott Reuben has perpetrated one of the biggest research frauds in medical history by faking the entire study. What’s even more frightening is that the studies were actually published without any type of control or oversight.
The medical journal, 'Anesthesia and Analgesia' retracted 10 papers written by Reuben, and medical experts at the time said at least 21 journal articles by the anesthesiologist appeared to be fabricated.[read more]
Apparently, this was not the first study faked by Dr. Reuben: He also faked the data for Bextra and Vioxx drugs, reports the Wall Street Journal.
“We are left with a large hole in our understanding of this field. There are substantial tendrils from this body of work that reach throughout the discipline of postoperative pain management.” Steven Shafer, editor-in-chief of Anesthesia and AnalgesiaSome of the studies reported favorable results from use of Pfizer’s Bextra and Merck’s Vioxx, both painkillers that have since been pulled from the market. Others offered good news about Pfizer’s pain drugs Lyrica and Celebrex and Wyeth’s antidepressant Effexor XR. Doctors said Reuben’s work was particularly influential in pain treatment and that they were shocked by the news. [read more]
Last March, Reuben was fired from his position at Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Massachusetts after an audit revealed he had been making up data for over 10 years.
“In my opinion, the Big Pharma companies more than likely knew of this, and possibly sought him out for his expertise in getting faked studies published.”
What's more notable about this story is not the fact that Reuben faked the clinical trials without patients. It's not the fact that these “scientific” medical journals published these lies. It's not even the fact that the drug companies paid Reuben close to half a million dollars to get their drugs pushed up to the front line for use in real patients.
The real story here is that, there really isn’t a story here, this is business as usual in the pharmaceutical industry.
Has the curtain been pulled back enough that you can see who is running the show?
Dr. Reuben's actions really aren't that extraordinary. Drug companies bribe researchers and doctors as a routine matter. Medical journals routinely publish false, fraudulent studies. FDA panel members regularly rely on falsified research in making their drug approval decisions, and the mainstream media regularly quotes falsified research in reporting the news.
Fraudulent research, in other words, is widespread in modern medicine. The pharmaceutical industry couldn't operate without it, actually. It is falsified research that gives the industry its best marketing claims and strongest FDA approvals. Quacks like Dr Scott Reuben are an important part of the pharmaceutical profit machine because without falsified research, bribery and corruption, the industry would have very little research at all.
Pay special attention to the fact that the Anesthesia & Analgesia medical journal gladly published Dr. Reuben's faked studies even though this journal claims to be a "scientific" medical journal based on peer review. Funny, isn't it, how such a scientific medical journal gladly publishes fraudulent research with data that was simply invented by the study author. Perhaps these medical journals should be moved out of the non-fiction section of university libraries and placed under science fiction.
Remember, too, that all the proponents of pharmaceuticals, vaccines and mammograms ignorantly claim that their conventional medicine is all based on "good science." It's all scientific and trustworthy, they claim, while accusing alternative medicine of being "woo woo" wishful thinking and non-scientific hype. Perhaps they should have a quick look in the mirror and realize it is their own system of quack medicine that's based largely on fraudulent research, bribery and corruption.
You just have to laugh, actually, when you hear pushers of vaccines and pharmaceuticals claim their medicine is "scientific" while natural medicine is "unproven." Sure it's scientific -- about as scientific as the storyline in a Scooby Doo cartoon, or as credible as the medical license of a six-year-old kid who just received a "let's play doctor" gift set for Christmas.
Many pharmaceutical researchers would have better careers as writers of fiction novels rather than scientific papers.
Many pharmaceutical researchers would have better careers as writers of fiction novels rather than scientific papers.
For all those people who ignorantly claim that modern pharmaceutical science is based on "scientific evidence," just give them these three words: Doctor Scott Reuben. [source]
Drug companies support fraudulent research
The drug companies claim to be innocent in all this, but behind the scenes they had to have known what was going on. Dr. Reuben's research was just too consistently favorable to drug company interests to be scientifically legitimate. If a drug company wanted to "prove" that their drug was good for some new application, all they had to do was ask Dr. Reuben to come up with the research (wink wink). "Here's another fifty thousand dollars to study whether our drug is good for post-surgical pain (wink)."
And before long, Dr. Reuben would magically materialize a brand new study that just happened to "prove" exactly what the sponsoring drug company wanted to prove. Advocates of western medicine claim they don't believe in magic, but when it comes to clinical trials, they actually do: All the results they wish to see just magically appear as long as the right researcher gets paid to materialize the results out of thin air, much like waving a magician's wand and chanting, "Abra cadabra... let there be RESEARCH DATA!"
Shazam! The research data materializes just like that. It all gets written up into a "scientific" paper that also magically gets published in medical journals that fail to ask a single question that might exposed the research fraud.
The whole system makes a mockery of real science. It is a system operated by criminals who fabricate whatever "scientific evidence" they need in order to get published in medical journals and win FDA approval for drugs that they fully realize are killing people.[source]
What is "Evidence-Based Medicine?"
The fact that a researcher like Dr. Reuben could so successfully fabricate fraudulent study data, then get it published in peer-reviewed science journals, and get away with it for 13 years sheds all kinds of new light on what's really behind "evidence-based medicine."
When pushers of pharmaceuticals and vaccines resort to quoting "evidence-based medicine" as their defense, keep in mind that much of their so-called evidence has been entirely fabricated. When they claim their branch of toxic chemical medicine is based on "real science," what they really mean is that it's based on fraudulent science but they've all secretly agreed to call it "real science." When they claim to have "scientific facts" supporting their position, what they really mean is that those "facts" were fabricated by criminal researchers being paid bribes by the drug companies.
"Scientific medicine" is a total fraud.
And this fraud isn't limited to Dr Scott Reuben, either. Remember: he engaged in routine research fraud for 13 years before being caught. There are probably thousands of other scientists engaged in similar research fraud right now who haven't yet been caught in the act. Their fraudulent research papers have no doubt already been published in "scientific" medical journals. They've been quoted in the popular press. They've been relied on by FDA decision makers to approve drugs as "safe and effective" for widespread use.
And yet underneath all this, there's nothing more than fraud and quackery. Sure, there may be some legitimate studies mixed in with all the fraud, but how can we tell the difference?
How are we to trust this system that claims to have a monopoly on scientific truth but in reality is a front for outright scientific fraud?
What is Positive about this discovery?
So we all agree that this guy is a jerk and should be put in prison, and the key should be thrown away.
At the same time, we must thank Dr Scott Reuben, for showing us the truth about the pharmaceutical industry, the research quackery, and the laughable "scientific" journals and the bribery and corruption that characterizes the pharmaceutical industry today.
You may be a dishonest, disgusting human being to most of the world, but you're a huge asset to the pharmaceutical industry and they need you back! There are more studies that need to be fabricated soon; more false papers that need to be published and more dangerous drugs that need to receive FDA approval. Hurry!
Because if there's one place that extreme dishonesty is richly rewarded, it's in the pharmaceutical industry, where poisons are approved as medicines and fiction is published as the truth.[source]
Are we beginning to Arise from the Illusion, yet?
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