Ethics

Nature, England's leading scientific journal, has announced a new policy. Beginning in October, it will "be encouraging authors to declare any competing financial interests in relation to research papers." This is "a welcome and probably inevitable decision," reports the Guardian of London, noting that science has become "intimately linked with industry. ...

Traditionally, universities have been reservoirs of independent thinking where tenured faculty had the academic freedom to analyze and interpret science and its implications for society without pressure from financially interested parties. But as funding ties between private industry and universities grow, the pool of independent research is shrinking. Karen Charman examines the growing sense of intimidation felt by academic critics of the biotechnology industry in particular.

Editors at the world's most prominent medical journals, alarmed that drug companies are exercising too much control over research results, have agreed to adopt a uniform policy that reserves the right to refuse to publish drug company-sponsored studies unless the researchers involved are guaranteed scientific independence. The journal editors decided to act after several recent cases involving charges that drug companies tried to withhold research results or present them in the most favorable way.

Media Relations, a Minneapolis-based PR firm, tells potential clients, "The media is separated into two categories. One is content and the other is advertising. They're both for sale." In a press release sent to media watch-dog group Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting, the firm explains that one can now buy news articles for less money than advertisements. That's because unlike other PR firms, Media Relations only charges clients for stories that get picked up by media. According to the firm's website, "Normally clients spend between $3,000 and $50,000 per month with us."