Who's Minding the Drug Store?

But remember, we don't actually sell our products. All of the resources we put into "sales and marketing" is really to make sure that physicians and patients are fully aware of all the information around the risks and benefits of the medicines we are offering. And then we leave it to the doctor and the patient to decide what is the best option for them.

– Pfizer CEO Hank McKinnell, interviewed by CNN's Aaron Brown, Dec. 20, 2004

How will the public remember science in the early 21st century? If 2004 was any guide, science may be recalled as a field in which principles were overtaken by filthy lucre.

It became even more fashionable than ever in 2004 to slam pharmaceutical companies at every turn for allowing the lure of profits to influence how they conducted research and interpreted data. To name a few episodes: the prolonged reexamination of the ...