Recording: British Paxil Users Meet With Brit FDA

Furious Seasons has posted the audio recording of the recent meeting between representatives of the Nine Elms Massive and patient advocates. I've made a couple of comments on there, if you're interested (and even if you're not interested, I've still made a couple of comments), but the upshot is that the Establishment has decided to defend its position - there is no attempt being made to address the issues with the industry that several commentators and patient advocates have raised. It seems to be about justifying the status quo, when the status quo is shit.

I listened to the recording for 36 minutes, and I was so disgusted with the whole fucking thing that I refused to expose myself to it, any further. It sounded very much like a PR exercize, nothing more. If the MHRA was really listening, it would be including its biggest (or at least most vocal), critics in the discussion and it would be addressing the issues that they raise, instead of justifying the machinations of the system, which, in their totality, I argue achieve precisely the opposite of what it is argued is being achieved.

What is being done to address the way in which companies have complete control over the trial of drugs, statistical analysis and writing of papers? What is being done to establish regulatory rules and guidelines, which fill the gaps left by legislation? Will the UK regulator address the question of its apparently flimsy assessment process - for example, why does it accept those dodgy academic papers as valid evidence of safety and efficacy, when there is evidence that this business of "information laundering" renders academia unreliable, to say the least?

Oh, it's all bollox - the halfwits don't want to change a damn thing, because it's not in their interests to change anything, and because they don't know how.

Matt