Study data at UCLA falsified

Los Angeles Times: By Jia-Rui Chong

A UCLA research associate tampered with data in a study of drug users and stole money intended for study subjects, a federal oversight office said Monday.

According to a notice in the Federal Register, James David Lieber, staff research associate at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, 'knowingly and intentionally falsified and fabricated' interviews, urine samples and urine sample records.

The project, which received funding from the National Institutes of Health, was led by Christine Grella, a UCLA research psychologist.

The study looked at what happened to female opiate addicts who had visited methadone clinics in Central and Southern California counties in the late 1970s.

'This is something we're quite unhappy about, obviously,' Grella said of the notice. ...

UCLA learned of the misconduct allegations in early 2006 and convened a panel to review his work, said Roberto Peccei, vice chancellor of research. Peccei said researchers removed the compromised data from the study and continued with their work. Lieber was discharged from the university.

"Ensuring the integrity of research conducted at UCLA is a duty of paramount importance, and this incident is a reminder that we must remain vigilant in fulfilling that obligation," Peccei said in a statement.

Roald Hoffmann's "Should've": Ethics and Science on Stage

Chemistry International -- Newsmagazine for IUPAC:

Ethics and social responsibility are not easy topics to address. However, the more the scientific community learns about nature and the world, the more these issues will take center stage. In fact, the stage is what Roald Hoffmann uses to explore the ethical dimensions of science in his latest play Should’ve. The play is a mystery, a savant mélange (what else would you expect from a chemist?) of people from different generations and backgrounds, who have to deal with issues of the past and the present, in science, art, and life.

RH: Yes, I believe that an ethical code of research is necessary, for all scientists (and the play makes the point that artists too are prone to the romantic fallacy that all they do is good). Scientists are not born with ethics, nor is science ethically neutral. I think courses in ethics, or better still discussion groups, based on case studies, should be a part of the education of all scientists, and also that discussion should be continued throughout life, even for experienced scientists. I actually would argue a stronger case, one with which many of my colleagues would not agree, that there is some research that should not be performed.

LC: Your play concerns ethics and moral behavior, which calls for judgments to be made. How do you judge the behavior of the famous German Jewish chemist Fritz Haber, who is responsible for the development of chemical warfare agents? And, how, may I ask, does this judgment differ from that of the famous German Jewish physicist Albert Einstein who called for the development of the atom bomb?

RH: I think Haber was naïve, thinking that chemical weapons would be a catalyst for change, and his naïveté and arrogance led him—in this part of his life—to a terribly wrong decision. I believe in an ethics that comes out of dialogue between human beings, not prescriptive rules. So I think that Einstein’s advocacy of atomic weapons, in his letter to Roosevelt, was justifiable as self-defense in the face of Nazi German aggression and immorality.

*********

About the Play

As Should’ve opens, Friedrich Wertheim, a German-born chemist, has taken his own life, blaming himself for putting an easy way to make a neurotoxin into the hands of terrorists. The circumstances and reasons for his death disturb profoundly the lives of three people—his daughter Katie (a scientist herself, a molecular biologist, but with very different ideas about the social responsibility of scientists), Katie’s lover Stefan (a conceptual artist), and Wertheim’s estranged second wife, Julia.

In 26 fast-moving scenes, these people’s lives are fractured by the suicide. The motive for Wertheim’s action isn’t as simple as it seems; a story about his parents’ survival in Nazi Germany emerges.

A play about the social responsibility of scientists and artists, Should’ve is also about three people trying to resist the transforming power of death. They are unable to do so, sundered as they are by the memories and a past that emerges from that death. And, eventually, the consequences shape a different bond among the three.

Smithsonian toned down exhibit on Arctic

Smithsonian toned down exhibit on Arctic - Yahoo! News:

WASHINGTON - The
Smithsonian Institution toned down an exhibit on climate change in the Arctic for fear of angering Congress and the Bush administration, says a former administrator at the museum.

Among other things, the script, or official text, of last year's exhibit was rewritten to minimize and inject more uncertainty into the relationship between global warming and humans, said Robert Sullivan, who was associate director in charge of exhibitions at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History.

Also, officials omitted scientists' interpretation of some research and let visitors draw their own conclusions from the data, he said. In addition, graphs were altered 'to show that global warming could go either way,' Sullivan said.

'It just became tooth-pulling to get solid science out without toning it down,' said Sullivan, who resigned last fall after 16 years at the museum. He said he left after higher-ups tried to reassign him.

At least the exhibit doesn't have cowboys saddling up dinosaurs! (See museum of creationism)

Latest US News Survey of Poor Job Prospects: Whistleblowers

Whistleblowers Charge Retaliation; More Protections Sought:
By William Fisher
t r u t h o u t | Report

Career federal employees who report waste, fraud, abuse and mismanagement in government agencies are routinely subjected to career-ending retaliation, humiliation and legal costs - despite laws that are supposed to protect them, and repeated assurances from the White House, many government agencies and Congress that there is zero tolerance for retaliation.

These are some conclusions of public interest organizations that monitor the federal bureaucracy. They say the incidence of retaliation has increased exponentially during the administration of President George W. Bush, and they are calling on Congress to strengthen legal protections for whistleblowers.

As more than 40 public interest groups marked 'Washington Whistleblowers Week' - a weeklong gathering of whistleblowers from throughout the country in Washington, DC, to share their stories with Congress and the public - Joan Claybrook, president of the advocacy group Public Citizen, said, 'Whistleblowers are crucial to the health of democracy and need stronger protections from Congress against retaliation.'...

Science relating to public health issues has also been under severe scrutiny. Emblematic of this problem was the resignation of Dr. Susan Wood, who quit her post as assistant commissioner of women's health at the Food and Drug Administration in protest against the FDA's long delay in approving the so-called Plan B emergency contraception medication for over-the-counter sale, despite the recommendations of agency scientists and outside review panels. Dr. Wood chose to resign after repeated unsuccessful attempts to make her objections heard within the FDA.

Dr. Wood charges that federal health agencies "seem increasingly unable to operate independently, and that this lack of independence compromises their mission of promoting public health and welfare." She added, "Whether it is the environment, energy policy, science education or public health, the American public expects our government to make the best decisions, based on the best available evidence."

"Having spent 15 years working for the federal government, nearly five of which were at the FDA, I care deeply about what's happening in the federal agencies, particularly our health agencies. Nearly twenty-five cents of every consumer dollar is spent on products regulated by the Food and Drug Administration. We count on the FDA for the safety and effectiveness of our medicines, vaccines and medical devices, and for the safety of the blood and food supply. The American public does not want to - nor should it - have to think twice about the quality and reliability of information it is getting from the FDA. Its reputation as the international gold standard for regulatory agencies, and as a body that sets the bar very high when it comes to scientific evidence and integrity, is being put at risk over adult access to contraception. Why would the administration risk such a reputation over this?"

Excerpted from a lengthy original report on Truthout.

Steamrolling whistleblowers

McClatchy Washington Bureau | 05/18/2007 | Ruling throws cold water on environmental whistleblowers: By David Goldstein
McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON - The sentence was buried deep within a recent Labor Department ruling, but the message was clear:

Whistleblowers, beware.

More specifically: Whistleblowers relying on the protections against official retaliation contained in several major environmental laws, proceed with caution.

The sentence was in a footnote at the end of a ruling against a federal whistleblower. It said the Labor Department recognized only the protections written into the clean air and solid waste-disposal acts, not laws governing clean water, drinking water, toxic substances and hazardous waste.

'This is the latest attack in a systematic war to gut the environmental whistleblowers' statutes,' charged Tom Devine, the legal director of the Government Accountability Project, a nonprofit watchdog group. 'They are a lifeline so government workers can challenge illegality without engaging in professional suicide.'

Establishing a code of conduct in the life sciences

From The Bulletin Online

Should life scientists make an oath analogous to the Hippocratic oath that newly minted physicians make in the belief that they will "do no harm" once they utter the hallowed words? The goal of a Hippocratic oath for life scientists would be to instill a sense of professionalism and responsibility so that they will not engage in potentially harmful activities. A number of advocates have supported the establishment of an oath for life scientists as a way to address concerns about potential future bioterrorists...

A Hippocratic oath for life scientists would be nice window dressing, but it would simply be that. The more important method to ensure that graduating life scientists are ethical and responsible citizens is the oversight provided by their laboratory supervisors, mentors, and/or thesis advisers. These individuals have an important role in watching their students' behavior over the years. Those who show irresponsible behavior and a diminished capacity for self-improvement should not be allowed to graduate (as should be the case in medical school). Graduate schools (and medical schools) should develop policies and procedures for problem students. Behavioral infractions should be carefully documented and should be just as important in the evaluation of a student's academic future as the traditional graduation requirements.

From a terribly confused piece in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. The author plainly does not know what the Hippocratic Oath actually says [which does not include "do no harm"], or its (properly) limited role in medical education and licensing. Nonetheless, she does get one thing (almost) right: "the medical profession [like virtually all professions] does not have a good track record in policing itself." She provides little reason for believing that life scientists are likely to do better, or that the steps she endorses relate adequately to her "do no harm" thesis.