To Cheat or Not to Cheat

Abstract

There has been a recent uproar about falsified data in biomedical research. This occurs with some regularity, and even Congress has been aroused recently with the justification that the perpetrators and the universities where they worked had received public grant monies. The incidents may have been relatively few in numbers, but the fires have been fanned by the media. Less publicized, but perhaps more disturbing is the apparent conflict of interest spread by many new biotechnology companies. Researchers who develop and evaluate their products are frequently given substantial chunks of the companies whose products they are testing.