Congress is in a tizzy; science leaders are worried legislation could do harm to the innocent WASHINGTON--Fraud in science has become a cause célébre among Washington politicians. For a two-week period this spring, it seemed that everywhere one looked there were concerned and aggrieved congressmen. And as the politicians aired the dirty linen of science in public and fulminated over measures they claimed needed to be taken to assure the public that science would be pursued in a spot

WASHINGTON—The proposed 5.4 percent increase next year for NIH is expected to be taken more seriously by Congress than previous budgets that President Reagan has submitted for health research. The 1989 request would lift the current NIH budget of $6.667 billion to $7.123 billion, a figure that includes $588 million for AIDS research. Last year NIH received $448 million for AIDS, a little less than one-half of the total federal spending on the disease. “This is the most realisti

WASHINGTON—The fear of lawsuits is blocking efforts to purge the scientific literature of articles by psychologist Stephen Breuning that are based on fraudulent data. The National Institute of Mental Health concluded this spring that Breuning “knowingly, willfully and repeatedly engaged in misleading and deceptive practices in reporting results of research.” Although all journal editors who published Breuning’s questionable papers were sent copies of the NIMH report, on