Dear Mr Lansley,
I emailed you earlier this morning bringing to your attention that the
main author of the NAC report on addiction to prescribed medicine,
Professor John Strang, had a conflict of interest in that he has a
consultancy with Genus Pharmaceuticals who manufacture lorazepam and
oxazepam which are benzodiazepine tranquillisers and the subject of
the report. Furthermore, Professor Strang made a false declaration
when tendering for commissioning of the report.
This will influence his judgement in the writing of the report.
I have since noticed that the NAC report has had a “Statement of
Interests” section added retrospectively on 22 July 2011 which making
the situation even worse with a heading “Inadvertently omitted in
original posting and hence added on 22nd July 2011.”
This occurred following the disclosure of this conflict on 8 July 2011.
It states on the report that you are still waiting for declarations by
four remaining authors and this shows that the declaration was not
prepared in the first place. Therefore it wasn’t “inadvertent” but a
deliberate decision to omit it in the first place.
Furthermore, all six authors would be aware that a declaration of
interest was required with any piece of research work and therefore
they were also party to the false declaration.
A proper declaration has still not been made stating that Genus
Pharmaceuticals manufacture lorazepam and oxazepam, benzodiazepine
tranquillisers which are the subject of the report
Furthermore, you cannot make retrospective declarations anymore than
you can get a retrospective MOT if you are caught without one.
The NAC report has been compromised by this breach of the Research
Councils UK policy and code of conduct on the governance of good
research conduct and the UK Research Integrity Office code of conduct
for research and its integrity cannot be retrieved by a retrospective
declaration.
Yours sincerely,
John Perrott