Just a little corruption, nothing to pay attention to
Health reporters may become entangled in the same kinds of ethical conflicts they often expose when accepting industry-sponsored awards and relying on corporate public relations offices, three researchers warn.
Journalism awards consisting of cash prizes and all-expense-paid trips given out by drug companies are among the more “astonishing” financial ties between journalists and drug companies, the authors said. The paper appears in the online edition of the British medical journal BMJ.
Among the prizes cited are the Embrace Award for reporting on urinary incontinence — consisting of trips to Washington, D.C., and Paris — offered by pharmaceutical firms Eli Lilly and Boehringer Ingelheim, as well as another Eli Lilly award for cancer treatment stories that includes a weeklong international trip for two.
The authors also point a finger at journalism training and education programs sponsored by the health care industry and to professorships funded by drug company grants. The writers go on to criticize reporters’ reliance on drug company press officers for referrals to experts or to patients, whose views may have been carefully screened.
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