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Subject:
From:
Susan Burger <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Lactation Information and Discussion <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Fri, 3 Feb 2006 07:32:07 -0500
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Dear all:

There are many fine researchers that contributing to Lacnet.  In my former life when I had time to 
do research, I followed the protocols I learned while at Cornell.  We actually did have to take an 
ethics class - one of the very few required classes -  because of the graduate student who had 
painted black spots on rats and fabricated his research.  Even without the course this was infused 
into every step of our progress towards our doctorate.  We routinely discussed ethics when we 
reviewed papers.

We just had an example of how corporate funding and the lack of an open review system can 
pervert research in a way that has dire consequences for infants.  I have quoted Chandra's 
research believing that it had undergone proper human subject review and peer review by an 
unbiased independent body.  I did not look closely enough at who funded the research and make 
the leap that the research was fabricated.

I do not see Chandra himself on Lactnet participating in our discussions and defending whatever 
motivations he had to fabricate his research and then try to sue the university so that those with 
legitimate questions would stop asking those questions.

One of the most important issues that the Chandra debacle brings up is that it is absolutely 
necessary to have an open and conflict of interest free process for conducting research so that 
appropriate checks and balances are in place.  Those who are in the position of conducting the 
human ethics review should be free of conflicts of interest.  Even with not for profit research this 
can be tricky, but when it is for profit research it is essential. 

Moreover, there are clearly defined protocols for the recruitment of human subjects for research.  
This does not necessarily mean that the subjects are directly receiving an intervention.  I had to 
undergo human subject review to analyze data that had been collected 20 years before in 
Guatemala to ensure that my research protocol was ethical.  How subjects are RECRUITED must 
undergo human ethics review, especially any incentives that are used to recruit subjects.  

I have never once seen one of those not for profit researchers that contribute ocaissionally to 
Lactnet recruit subjects on Lactnet or defend how they are recruiting subjects on Lactnet.  They go 
through a human subjects review board.  Recruiting subjects for human research in a for profit 
setting is essentially asking for a donation to conduct their research even if the donated substance 
is funneled through a not for profit institution - it ultimately goes to the for profit institution.  It 
seems to me that the dicussion of whether or not this is ethical should take place in a setting that 
is free from conflicts of interest and pressure from those parties that have a stake in the outcome.   
It is in that regard that I consider it to be advertising when those with a vested interest in a 
research process that may result in a human milk substitute (albeit modified from that human 
milk) being developed and sold.  Make no mistake, if hospitals are paying for a product, the 
consumer pays even if it is in such an indirect way that they are not aware of how they are paying 
for it.  

Susan Burger

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