Mad Cow Cover-Up: NIH Plans to Destroy Brain Samples of Humans Afflicted with Mad Cow-Like CJD
Steve Mitchell of UPI has been providing excellent, ongoing coverage of mad cow and its threats in the US. Here is his latest piece. One more strong piece of evidence of the cover-up ‹ it now deserves that label ‹ of mad cow risks here in the US under an administration beholden to big beef.
John Stauber
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NIH may destroy human brain collection
<http://www.washtimes.com/upi-breaking/20050323-053919-8481r.htm
Washington Times - Washington,DC,USA NIH may destroy human brain collection
By Steve Mitchell Medical Correspondent
Washington, DC, Mar. 24 (UPI) -- The National Institutes of Health may discard part or all of a rare collection that includes hundreds of human brain samples from patients that suffered from a disorder similar to mad cow disease -- unless another researcher or institution takes them on, United Press International has learned.
Several scientists said the collection, which is held by the NIH's National Institute for Neurological Disorders and Stroke in Bethesda, Md. -- and includes brains and other tissue samples from people afflicted with the brain-wasting illness Creutzfeldt Jakob disease -- is irreplaceable and could even provide insight into treatments for the fatal disorder.
Currently, there is no cure for CJD and patients typically die within a year after symptoms begin.
However, NIH officials in control of the collection's fate told UPI the remaining samples are of little scientific value and may be disposed of if researchers outside the agency do not claim it. That position stands in sharp contrast with CJD experts who thought the collection should be preserved.
"It's invaluable," said Dr. Paul Brown, former medical director of the NIH's Laboratory for Central Nervous System Studies, whose expertise is in CJD and mad cow disease (also known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE).
The collection is badly in need of organization and no one is certain how many brains or other tissue samples it contains, said Brown, who worked with the collection since its inception in the 1960's until his retirement last year. There could be brains, blood, spinal fluid and various other tissues from 1,000 people or more, he said. Some of the specimens would be of scientific use today, he said.
"This collection has the unique value of stretching back to the beginning of when these diseases were discovered," Brown told UPI, noting that the first samples were obtained in 1963. "It would be as though you had in your hands the possibility of finding out when AIDS started."
Bruce Johnson, a former technician at the CNSS lab who worked extensively with the collection before he retired in 2003, told UPI he was told "in two years they (NIH officials)are going to destroy it, if nobody wants it."
Eugene Major, acting director of the basic neuroscience program at the NIH, said no specific timeframe had been established.
"We have not set a firm deadline date," Major told UPI. "We are working very hard with investigators that we know in order to be able to make sure that whatever we deem is valuable is potentially kept here." Some samples already have been determined not to have any research value and have been "removed and disposed of," he said.
Others samples have been given out to Dr. David Asher at the Food and Drug Administration and Pierluigi Gambetti at the National Prion Disease Pathology Surveillance Center in Cleveland, Ohio.
Major maintained the remaining collection was not particularly valuable for research. "Whatever had been collected here that has not already been distributed to responsible investigators who could use them really has very little remaining value," he said.
Neither Asher nor Gambetti returned phone calls from UPI, but Brown said he thought Asher had received only a dozen or two samples at most and Gambetti had not received much at all.
Neil Cashman, a brain-disease researcher at the University of Toronto's Center for Research in Neurodegenerative Diseases -- who has tried to obtain the collection from the NIH -- said it was priceless.
"It would be like destroying an art museum," Cashman told UPI. "There's all this information and insight that's locked up in these tissues and if it's destroyed it will be lost forever."
The Memorial Institute for Neurodegenerative Diseases Inc., a non-profit organization consisting of more than 40 university and institute researchers from the United States, Canada, United Kingdom and France, also thinks the brain collection is invaluable.
"It is the opinion of the Board of Directors ... of The MIND Inc., that the ... brain bank should not be broken up nor destroyed," said Harry E. Peery, MIND's executive director, in a letter to UPI. "We believe that this collection is of inestimable research value and should be kept intact."
The institute, at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, applied for possession of the collection in early 2004, but received a letter from the NINDS indicating the fate of the collection had not yet been determined.
"We have heard nothing further since that time" and continue to be interested in acquiring the complete collection, Peery said.
CJD belongs to a group of rare, brain-wasting disorders that are little understood, incurable and fatal. This includes mad cow disease in cows, chronic wasting disease in deer and elk. The most infamous of these illnesses in humans is variant CJD, which people can contract from eating beef products infected with the mad-cow pathogen.
Although vCJD has infected more than 154 people worldwide, only one case has ever been detected in the United States -- in a Florida woman who is thought to have contracted the disease while living in the United Kingdom. However, the NIH brain samples have never been screened for vCJD -- something Johnson thinks is critically important.
"No one has ever looked to see if any American (in the collection) in the past had variant CJD," Johnson said. "You think it would be required that they do that. You think it would be a Congressional mandate that they test these brains: 'Let's see if we've got this disease in our country.'"
Johnson noted at least one brain in the collection he personally had examined -- from a French woman collected in 1971 -- showed evidence of possible vCJD infection, but the sample needed further study to be sure.
Other samples in the collection include the brains of patients who were only 16 years old when they were diagnosed with CJD. This would be unusual for sporadic CJD, because generally it strikes those over age 60. Variant CJD, on the other hand, typically occurs in patients in their 20s or younger.
"I thought it was absolutely vital (to test these brains)," Johnson said. "Maybe there's a dozen cases in there of variant CJD."
Major disagreed. "There's really no reason to do that," he said. "The effort it would take to screen those samples ... would not give us any new insights into variant CJD beyond what it is we already know."
Johnson said he was frustrated with the NIH administration's lack of interest in preserving the collection or testing for vCJD. "They don't understand," he said, "they honest-to-god don't understand what it's all about."
Patient advocates also objected to the possible destruction of the brains.
Terry Singeltary, whose mother died of a type of CJD called Heidenhain variant in 1997, said he is outraged and families of other CJD victims probably will be, too.
"A lot of these families went through a lot of heartache and a lot of trouble to get these brain samples to the NIH," Singeltary told UPI. "Now they're just going to discard them because they're not of scientific use? That's just asinine. That stuff is valuable information."
Graham Steel, vice-chair of the Human BSE Foundation in the United Kingdom, told UPI, "The potential loss of such important tissue samples would be a massive blow for TSE (the group of diseases that includes CJD and BSE) research in the United States. This should not be allowed to happen."
Singeltary noted there currently is no cure for these diseases. "If you don't have any answers yet, why would you throw these specimens away?" he asked.
He added that more sensitive tests are just becoming available and could help determine the origin of some of the CJD cases. "We've all been sitting around waiting for more sensitive tests to get validated because we want answers," he said.
"You know, it must be an embarrassment," Johnson said. "Some Senator is going to eventually say 'What is NIH doing about mad cow disease?' And people are going to scratch their heads and say 'not much'." He added, "What's going to happen (is) one of these senators or their wife is going to develop spontaneous CJD one day and ... there's going to be hell raised and they're going to ask, 'Why isn't NIH working on this?'"
--
E-mail
[email protected]
NIH sends mixed signals on CJD brains
By Steve Mitchell
Medical Correspondent
Washington, DC, Apr. 7 (UPI) -- A National Institutes of Health official who told United Press International the agency might destroy its collection of brains from human patients afflicted with a condition similar to mad cow disease reportedly has told the head of a patient-advocate group the collection would be preserved.
The official, Eugene Major, acting director of the basic neuroscience program at the NIH, has not responded to e-mail or a phone call from UPI seeking clarification of his remarks, and the official status of the collection remains unknown.
As reported by UPI on March 24, the collection is stored in freezers by the NIH's National Institute for Neurological Disorders and Stroke in Bethesda, Md. It contains brains and other tissue samples from hundreds of people who died from the brain-wasting illness Creutzfeldt Jakob disease, as well as tissues from an untold number of experimental animals.
The consensus of scientists in this field is the collection, which dates back to 1963, is invaluable for research and could even provide insight into treatments for the fatal disorder. Currently, there is no cure for CJD and patients typically die within a year after symptoms begin.
Florence Kranitz, president of the non-profit advocacy group CJD Foundation, told UPI she had "a very long conversation" with Major, in which he told her the remaining tissues in the collection would not be destroyed.
"He reassured me in no uncertain terms," Kranitz said, noting constituents of the foundation and other CJD advocacy groups had been expressing concerns to her the tissues would be destroyed.
Kranitz, who has personal reasons for wanting the collection preserved -- her husband died of CJD in 2000 -- said she plans to meet with Major at the end of April to discuss the issue further.
CJD belongs to a group of diseases collectively known as transmissible spongiform encephalopathies, or TSEs, that includes mad cow disease in cows, chronic wasting disease in deer and elk, and scrapie in sheep. All TSEs are incurable and fatal.
Major previously told UPI some samples already have been destroyed and others have been given to researchers at the Food and Drug Administration and the National Prion Disease Pathology Surveillance Center in Cleveland.
Major said the remaining collection "has very little remaining value" and could be destroyed if another entity does not claim them.
Bruce Johnson, a former NIH scientist who retired at the end of 2003, said he had been told the collection would be destroyed in two years if no one took the samples from the NIH.
In response to hearing that Major had failed to confirm to UPI the brain collection would not be destroyed, Patricia Ewanitz, who lives in Port Jefferson Station, N.Y., and is founder of the advocacy group CJD Voice, said, "The brain tissue might not be indispensable to the National Institutes of Health but it is absolutely necessary to the families who thought enough of science to donate the brains, brain tissue and blood in hopes of someday finding an answer to why their loved one died."
Ewanitz, whose husband died of CJD in 1997, added, "It now seems like such a joke."
Terry Singeltary, whose mother passed away from a type of CJD in 1997, said the NIH should use the samples for scientific research, not just store them in freezers.
Both Singeltary and Ewanitz said they would feel more reassured if Major verified in writing the collection will not be destroyed.
"I would go further and ask Major what he plans to do with them," Singeltary said. "If the samples are just going to sit up there and go bad, then they should give them out to researchers looking for cause and cure."
The revelation the NIH might destroy part or all of the collection sparked an outcry from patient advocates, consumer groups and scientists.
Advocates have been contacting their members of Congress, urging them to investigate and prevent the NIH from destroying the brains. Consumer groups also have gotten involved and scientists have taken steps to obtain the collection or have urged Major not to destroy the samples.
Felicia Nestor, who serves as a consultant to Public Citizen, told UPI she had contacted certain legislators and at least one was considering looking into the situation. Nestor asked the legislator's name be withheld.
Kranitz said Major also told her he plans "to advertise in professional neurological journals and by whatever means necessary to make it known" to researchers in the field the tissues are available.
Major previously said, however, that efforts to inform researchers of the availability of the collection were already underway and included informing NIH grantees. He added he had personally notified researchers at scientific meetings, but no TSE researcher contacted by UPI was aware of this.
"I was never informed," said Laura Manuelidis, an expert on these diseases and section chief of surgery in the neuropathology department at Yale University. She said the first she had heard of the situation was in UPI's March 24 report.
Manuelidis also said she contacted Major, expressing interest in the specimens, but so far has not received a response.
"I sent a letter to (Major) on (March 25) about our interest in these specimens, but he has not replied," she told UPI in an e-mail.
Neil Cashman, a TSE expert at the University of Toronto, who said he was not aware the samples might be destroyed, has lobbied colleagues at the University of British Columbia -- where Cashman is scheduled to move to this summer -- to help draft a letter requesting the collection.
The Memorial Institute for Neurodegenerative Diseases Inc., a non-profit organization consisting of more than 40 university and institute researchers from the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and France, requested the collection in January, 2004. So far, the institute has not been informed of a decision by the NIH.
Asked if Major had told him whether the collection would be preserved, MIND Executive Director Harry Peery said, "We have heard nothing further from Eugene Major or anyone else at the NIH regarding the brain collection."
--
E-mail:
[email protected]
##################### Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy #####################
NIH says it will preserve CJD brains
By STEVE MITCHELL
WASHINGTON, May 31 (UPI) -- The National Institutes of Health apparently has reversed its position on the fate of an invaluable collection of brains from people afflicted with a condition similar to mad cow disease, saying in a letter to a U.S. senator it will not destroy the collection.
An NIH official had told United Press International previously that the brain collection, which consists of samples from hundreds of people who died from the brain-wasting illness called Creutzfeldt Jakob disease, could be discarded if another entity does not claim them.
That sparked an outcry from patient-advocacy groups, consumer watchdogs and scientists, and the agency now appears to have backed away from that course.
"All the brains and other tissues with potential to help scientists learn about CJD are, and will continue to be, conserved," Story Landis, director of the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, which oversees the brain collection, wrote in a May 10 letter to Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas.
Cornyn had inquired about the status of the collection in April.
Last March, Eugene Major, acting director of the basic neuroscience program at the NIH, told UPI the useful portions of the collection had been doled out to scientists and the remaining samples had "very little remaining value" and could be destroyed.
Landis could not be reached for comment Tuesday. NINDS spokesman Paul Girolami told UPI he had been unable to locate her.
Scientists think the collection, which dates back to 1963, is invaluable for research on CJD and similar diseases and could even provide insight into treatments. There is no cure for CJD and patients typically die within a year after symptoms begin.
"Absolutely, the collection is worth keeping," Bruce Johnson, a former NIH scientist who said he had been told the collection would be destroyed in two years if no one took the samples from the agency, told UPI.
The Memorial Institute for Neurodegenerative Diseases Inc., a non-profit organization consisting of more than 40 researchers from several countries, offered to take the collection off of NIH's hands more than a year ago and so far has not heard anything from the agency, Harry Peery, MIND's executive director, told UPI.
CJD belongs to a group of incurable and fatal diseases collectively known as transmissible spongiform encephalopathies, or TSEs, that includes mad cow disease in cows, chronic wasting disease in deer and elk, and scrapie in sheep.
Variant CJD, or vCJD, is a relatively new TSE, which people can contract from consuming beef products infected with the mad cow pathogen.
Despite Landis' assurance the collection will be preserved, some family members of the patients who donated their brains to the NIH are still skeptical. This is because the wording Landis used in the letter leaves open the possibility that some brain samples are being destroyed.
"The tissues that are discarded are those that have either decayed to an extent that renders them no longer appropriate for research or those for which we do not have sufficient identification," Landis wrote.
"Which ones" are being destroyed? asked Terry Singeltary, who is involved with several CJD patient groups.
"With a system like this, they could destroy whatever and whenever they wanted, for whatever reason they wanted," Singeltary, whose mother died of CJD in 1997, told UPI.
"It's a perfect excuse to discard some suspicious tissue resembling vCJD or some atypical TSE related to animal TSEs in the USA," he added.
Although the collection includes samples from CJD patients as young as 16 that could make them candidates for possible vCJD, the brains have never been screened for evidence of the disease. The only confirmed vCJD case in the United States occurred in a Florida woman who is thought to have contracted the disease in England.
Johnson said he along with renowned CJD expert Paul Brown were in the process of sorting through the samples to match them up with patient identification documents until they both retired. Some of the samples may prove impossible to identify, he said, but he and Brown are the only ones familiar enough with the collection to organize it and neither has been asked back by the agency to aid in the identification process.
Steve Mitchell is UPI's Medical Correspondent. E-mail:
[email protected]
Copyright 2005 by United Press International. All Rights Reserved.
http://washingtontimes.com/upi-brea...50800-6771r.htm
http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/ind...s-cjdbrains.xml
=====================
JOHN CORNYN
TEXAS
UNITED STATES SENATE
WASHINGTON, DC 20510-4305
April 26,2005
Mr. Terry SingeltaryP.O. Box 42Bacliff, Texas 77518
Dear Mr. Singeltary:
In response to your recent request for my assistance, I have contacted the National Institutes ofHealth. I will write you again as soon as I receive a reply.
I appreciate having the opportunity to represent you in the United States Senate and to be ofservice in this matter.
Sincerely,
JOHN CORNYN
United States Senator
JC:djl
===============
JOHN CORNYN
TEXAS
UNITED STATES SENATE
WASHINGTON, DC 20510-4305
May 18,2005
Mr. Terry SingeltaryP.O. Box 42Bacliff, Texas 77518
Dear Mr. Singeltary:
Enclosed is the reply I received from the Department of Health and Human Services in
response to my earlier inquiry on your behalf. I hope this will be useful to you.
I appreciate having the opportunity to represent you in the United States Senate.
Thank you for taking time to contact me.
Sincerely,
JOHN CORNYN
United States Senate
JC:djl
Enclosure
DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH & HUMAN SERVICES
National Institutes of HealthNational Institute of NeurologicalDisorders and Stroke
NINDS
Building 31, Room 8A52
31 Center Dr., MSC 2540
Bethesda, Maryland 20892-2540
Phone: 301-496-9746
Fax: 301-496-0296
Email:
[email protected]
May 10, 2005
The Honorable John CornynUnited States SenatorOccidental Tower5005 LBJ Freeway, Suite 1150Dallas, Texas 75244-6199
Dear Senator Cornyn:
Your letter to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) forwarding correspondence from Mr. Terry
S. Singeltary, Sr., has been forwarded to me for reply. Mr. Singeltary is concerned about thepreservation of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) brain samples that have been maintained by theNational Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) Intramural Research programfor many years.
I am sorry to learn that Mr. Singeltary's mother died of CJD and can certainly understand hisdesire that any tissues that could help investigators unravel the puzzle of this deadly disease arepreserved. I hope he will be pleased to learn that all the brains and other tissues with potential tohelp scientists learn about CJD are, and will continue to be, conserved. (The tissues that arediscarded are those that have either decayed to an extent that renders them no longer appropriatefor research or those for which we do not have sufficient identification.)
The purpose of gathering these brains and tissues is to help scientists learn about CJD. To that
end, some of the NINDS-held samples are distributed to investigators who can demonstrate thatthey have a compelling research or public health need for such materials. For example, sampleshave been transferred to NIH grantee Dr. Pierluigi Gambetti, who heads the National PrionDiseases Pathology Surveillance Center at Case Western Reserve University in Ohio and workswith the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to monitor all cases of CJD in the UnitedStates. Dr. Gambetti studies the tissues to learn about the formation, physical and chemicalproperties, and pathogenic mechanisms of prion proteins, which are believed to be involved inthe cause of CJD. Samples have also been transferred to Dr. David Asher, at the U.S. Food andDrug Administration, for use in assessing a potential diagnostic test for CJD.
Page 2 - The Honorable John Cornyn
in closing, we know that donating organs and tissue from loved ones is a very difficult andpersonal choice that must often be made at the most stressful of times. We at the NINDS aregrateful to those stalwart family members who make this choice in the selfless hope that it willhelp others afflicted with CJD. We also know the invaluable contribution such donations maketo the advancement of medical science, and we are dedicated to the preservation of all of thetissue samples that can help in our efforts to overcome CJD.
I hope this information is helpful to you in responding to Mr. Singeltary.
Sincerely,
Story C. Landis, Ph.D.
Director, National Institute ofNeurological Disorders and Stroke
==================================
TSS
a.. see re-NIH to destroy brain samples and tissues
TSS
#################### https://lists.aegee.org/bse-l.html ####################
----- Original Message -----
From: "Terry S. Singeltary Sr." <
[email protected]>
To: <
[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, July 01, 2006 6:25 PM
Subject: Re: CJD TISSUE DONATIONS FROM OUR LOVED ONES UP FOR SALE TO HIGHEST BIDDERS
> ##################### Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy #####################
>
> Science 23 June 2006:
> Vol. 312. no. 5781, p. 1733
> DOI: 10.1126/science.312.5781.1733
>
> News of the Week
>
> U.S. BIOETHICS:
>
> House Panel Finds Fault With How NIH Handles Tissue Samples
>
> Jocelyn Kaiser
>
> A congressional finding that a drug company paid a National Institutes of
> Health (NIH) scientist for spinal fluid samples has raised a larger
> question: What happens to NIH's archived patient samples? NIH's efforts to
> improve practices within its intramural program come as U.S. medical centers
> are trying to tighten controls over such materials.
>
> At a 2-day hearing last week, Joe Barton (R-TX), chair of the House Energy
> and Commerce Committee, complained about the "lack of a centralized database
> [for patient samples] and a lack of oversight at NIH that could, and
> probably does, leave NIH laborator[ies] vulnerable to the risks of theft and
> abuse." NIH officials testified they have already begun to improve their
> procedures.
>
> But outside scientists agree with NIH that the agency needs time to organize
> its millions of stored specimens. "People have their samples everywhere,"
> with details recorded on everything from paper notepads to computers, says
> Mark Sobel, a former NIH researcher who is now executive officer of the
> American Society for Investigative Pathology. Creating a central registry of
> NIH's holdings, he predicts, "is going to be a massive undertaking."
>
> Barton's ethics investigation is an extension of an earlier one questioning
> large payments from drug companies to senior NIH scientists. That led NIH to
> ban industry consulting by its intramural scientists last August (Science, 2
> September 2005, p. 1469). Last week's hearing focused on Alzheimer's disease
> researcher Trey Sunderland of the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
> and his dealings with drug giant Pfizer.
>
> The committee pursued a complaint from Susan Molchan, a former clinical
> researcher in Sunderland's lab, that Sunderland wouldn't provide her with
> some of her old spinal fluid samples. Staffers eventually learned that
> Sunderland had sent Pfizer about 3200 spinal fluid samples and 388 plasma
> samples he and others had collected since the early 1980s, including some
> from Molchan, along with clinical data, from Alzheimer's patients and
> controls. The company used them to study so-called biomarkers, proteins that
> might serve as indicators for the neurodegenerative disease.
>
> Pfizer had signed a Material Transfer Agreement with NIMH for the samples in
> April 1998. Around the same time, Sunderland signed a consulting agreement
> with Pfizer that eventually paid him $285,000. A 26-page bipartisan report
> released last week by the Commerce Committee's oversight and investigations
> subcommittee found "reasonable grounds to believe" that Pfizer made the
> payments in exchange for the samples. Neither this agreement nor others with
> Pfizer, for which Sunderland was paid more than $300,000 over several years,
> were reported to NIH.
>
> Figure 1 Exhibit A. Concerns that NIH researcher Trey Sunderland (with
> former co-worker Karen Putnam at a congressional hearing) was paid for
> patient tissue samples have triggered a call for a central NIH database.
>
> CREDIT: CHRISTINE MCCARTY
> At the hearing, NIH officials said the transfer and consulting agreements
> would not have been approved because they improperly mixed official duties
> with consulting. "You could have both collaboration and consulting [but not]
> with the same agent," said NIMH Director Thomas Insel. Insel said Sunderland
> instead should have organized a cooperative agreement with the company for
> which he would not have been paid.
>
> Sunderland and a co-worker, Karen Putnam, invoked their constitutional right
> to decline to answer questions before the committee. Sunderland has said
> that his staff simply failed to complete the proper paperwork, and his
> attorney Robert Muse says that "there is no truth to the allegation that Dr.
> Sunderland received a penny from Pfizer for the samples." NIH investigators
> earlier found that Sunderland had committed serious misconduct, and Insel
> suggested to the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps that he be
> terminated. The corps has put his retirement on hold, however, and the
> Department of Health and Human Services Inspector General's office and the
> Department of Justice are still investigating.
>
> The committee's report also questions whether Sunderland had obtained proper
> informed consent from some patients for the Pfizer study. NIH officials told
> the subcommittee that they have tightened rules on the sharing of human
> tissues, including adding a requirement that investigators describe future
> plans for samples to an Institutional Review Board (IRB). In the mid-1990s,
> the policy was "very general," Insel said.
>
> Indeed, a decade ago, researchers themselves often decided the fate of
> leftover samples, says bioethicist Mark Rothstein of the University of
> Louisville in Kentucky. Since bioethics council and other U.S. and
> international advisory bodies have called for better controls on the use of
> stored human tissue (Science, 18 December 1998, p. 2165). Reviews of old
> collections have revealed that informed consent forms are often missing,
> leaving IRBs to decide whether samples can be used, Rothstein says: "It's
> been a revelation."
>
> But NIH officials say they need more time to figure out whether a central
> database of tissue specimens would make sense for the intramural program.
> The agency is looking at combining a new campuswide database of clinical
> trials with sample barcoding systems, says NIH Deputy Director for
> Intramural Research Michael Gottesman. And although extramural researchers
> have also traditionally tracked their samples individually, NIH's largest
> institute, the National Cancer Institute, is encouraging cancer centers to
> tally their tumor specimens in databases so sharing will be easier.
>
> Insel warned that moving toward a central system too quickly could add
> "speed bumps" to the scientific process. Legislators haven't said if they
> plan to require a central database.
>
>
> http://www.sciencemag.org/
>
>
> TSS
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Terry S. Singeltary Sr." <
[email protected]>
> To: <
[email protected]>
> Sent: Wednesday, June 14, 2006 9:14 AM
> Subject: CJD TISSUE DONATIONS FROM OUR LOVED ONES UP FOR SALE TO HIGHEST
> BIDDERS
>
>
> ##################### Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy
> #####################
>
> Subject: CJD TISSUE DONATIONS FROM OUR LOVED ONES UP FOR SALE TO HIGHEST
> BIDDERS
> Date: June 14, 2006 at 6:40 am PST
> Greetings CJD VOICE,
>
> IF i would have been aware of all this greed, i would have never ever
> donated my mother's brain for research. NIH AND PFIZER SHOULD BE HELD
> ACCOUNTABLE for there disgraced actions. you cant tell me they did not know.
> ...TSS
>
> US scientist accused of selling tissue samples
> Deal said to earn $285,000 for vials that cost millions
> By Diedtra Henderson, Globe Staff | June 14, 2006
>
> WASHINGTON -- A senior government scientist pocketed hundreds of thousands
> of dollars as a drug company consultant in exchange for human tissue samples
> that cost the federal government millions to acquire, congressional
> investigators said yesterday .
>
> The House Energy and Commerce Committee report, the culmination of a
> one-year inquiry, was released hours before a two-day hearing began to
> explore the government's practices for procuring human tissue samples.
> According to congressional investigators, the National Institutes of
> Health's Dr. Trey Sunderland agreed to collaborate with Pfizer Inc. , the
> world's largest drug company. Sunderland, chief of the geriatric psychiatry
> branch of the National Institute for Mental Health , sent Pfizer 3,200 tubes
> of spinal fluid and 388 tubes of plasma collected for Alzheimer's research.
>
> The government spent $6.4 million to obtain the 3,500 samples that showed
> how Alzheimer's disease progressed in 538 subjects.
>
> Pfizer paid Sunderland $285,000 in consulting fees related to the samples,
> investigators said. In total, Pfizer paid him more than $600,000 from 1998
> to 2004 for outside consulting and speaking fees. Sunderland is scheduled to
> testify today at the hearing.
>
> ``Contrary to the House committee report, Dr. Sunderland did not receive any
> payments from Pfizer for human tissue samples," said Robert F. Muse, the
> scientist's Washington, D.C., attorney. ``He acted properly, ethically, and
> legally in his relationship with Pfizer."
>
> Pfizer spokeswoman Kate Robins said the company had a transfer agreement
> endorsed by the NIH that permitted Sunderland to send cerebrospinal fluid
> from research participants with Alzheimer's, the participant's relatives who
> were at higher risk of developing the neurological disease, and elderly
> adults with normal Alzheimer's risk.
>
> Sunderland's consulting role tapped his Alzheimer's disease expertise to
> look for signals in the samples that could help identify and diagnose the
> disease.
>
> ``The payments over a six-year period were reasonable and customary for an
> expert of Dr. Sunderland's stature, and reflect the fair-market value of his
> consulting services," Robins said.
>
> The report said the tissue transfers, reported by a government
> whistleblower, raised serious questions about how the government ensures its
> scientists do not abuse their positions and about the agency's ability to
> track the valuable samples.
>
> ``NIH tells us it has no centralized inventory system that could tell the
> NIH director how many vials of tissues are in freezers at a particular
> institute," said Representative Joe Barton , Republican of Texas and House
> Energy and Commerce Committee chairman . ``It would really be a shame if we
> find out that the National Institutes of Health has more control over its
> paper clips and trash cans than it has over its human tissue samples."
>
> John T. Burklow , a NIH spokesman, said the agency shares ``the committee's
> concerns in regard to the ethical management of human tissue samples."
>
> Sunderland's arrangement with the drug maker -- made without NIH knowledge,
> according to Burklow -- occurred after the agency relaxed its ethics policy
> covering scientists' outside activities and ended before the agency enacted
> more stringent rules.
>
> The NIH, pressured by Barton's committee, on Aug. 25 curbed outside
> consulting deals between its scientists and pharmaceutical and biotechnology
> companies.
>
> Diedtra Henderson can be reached at
[email protected].
>
> © Copyright 2006 Globe Newspaper Company.
>
>
> http://www.boston.com/business/globe/articles/2006/06/14/us_scientist_accused_of_selling_tissue_samples/
>
>
>
>
> FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
> Tuesday, June 13, 2006
>
>
>
> CONTACT:
> OD Office of Communications
> and Public Liaison
> 301-496-5787
>
>
> NIH Statement Regarding House Hearing on Human Tissue Samples
> Attribution: John Burklow, NIH spokesman
>
> NIH's position on ethics is clear: any conflict of interest resulting in an
> individual personally profiting from official government research activities
> cannot be tolerated. We are committed to maintaining the public's trust in
> NIH and its scientists as an unbiased source of biomedical research guidance
> and advice. The case under consideration concerns events that began in
> 1998 — after the NIH ethics rules concerning outside activities were
> relaxed — and that ended before the new rules were put in place. NIH has
> previously referred this case to the relevant authorities for appropriate
> action.
>
> It is important to note that the specific consulting arrangements in
> question, had they been known to NIH, would not have been approved under the
> present or previous ethics regulations. Outside consulting connected to an
> NIH employee's official government duties has always been prohibited at NIH.
>
> NIH has undertaken a comprehensive review of its activities and conflict of
> interest policies in the last few years. As a result of that process, on
> August 25, 2005, NIH implemented comprehensive ethics rules that make it
> clear what NIH scientists can and cannot do in regard to outside activities.
> These new rules removed any ambiguity about what is allowed or not allowed.
> Here are two important points:
>
> Under new NIH regulations, all NIH employees are now prohibited from
> engaging in outside employment with pharmaceutical companies and
> biotechnology companies in their private capacities — period.
> Collaboration and partnership with industry can nonetheless be very valuable
> in scientific pursuits and NIH rules allow such activities, as long as they
> are undertaken through an officially approved Cooperative Research and
> Development Agreement (CRADA).
> Although we cannot discuss this particular case because it remains under
> investigation, we can speak to the relevant issues that it raises.
>
> Collaborations among scientists that involve human tissue samples are common
> and essential for science. There are, however, stringent rules in place to
> protect the participants who donated their samples, and to ensure that there
> is full informed consent.
>
> We share the Committee's concerns in regard to the ethical management of
> human tissue samples and the development of rigorous and uniform policies to
> protect the public's trust and interests, while advancing science to address
> important public health problems. The thousands of scientists who work at
> NIH have always been and remain committed to these principles.
>
> The Office of the Director, the central office at NIH, is responsible for
> setting policy for NIH, which includes 27 Institutes and Centers. This
> involves planning, managing, and coordinating the programs and activities of
> all NIH components. The Office of the Director also includes program offices
> which are responsible for stimulating specific areas of research throughout
> NIH. Additional information is available at http://www.nih.gov/icd/od/.
>
> The National Institutes of Health (NIH) — The Nation's Medical Research
> Agency — includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S.
> Department of Health and Human Services. It is the primary federal agency
> for conducting and supporting basic, clinical and translational medical
> research, and it investigates the causes, treatments, and cures for both
> common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs,
> visit www.nih.gov.
>
>
>
> http://www.nih.gov/news/pr/jun2006/od-13.htm
>
> tss