BBC News - Lack of drug data 'extreme concern'

"The lack of data on the effectiveness of medicines available to doctors and researchers is 'of extreme concern' say a group of MPs. The Public Accounts Committee is calling for all data on drugs being prescribed in the UK to be made available. It also says the government spent £424m stockpiling the antiviral Tamiflu despite a lack of agreement on how effective the drug is. Campaigners called for 'urgent action'. Half of trial data is not being published and pharmaceutical companies have a strong bias towards revealing the positive results, the committee's report says. It raises questions about whether patients are being given the medication which is most likely to save their lives. Richard Bacon, a member of the Committee of Public Accounts, commented: 'The ability of doctors, researchers and patients to make informed decisions about treatments is being undermined. 'The full results of clinical trials are being routinely and legally withheld from doctors and researchers by the manufacturers of medicines.' He said it was 'of extreme concern to this committee' that favourable evidence was more likely to be published. All trials The group of MPs called for data on 'all trials on all uses of all treatments currently being prescribed' to be made available. Transparency in clinical trials is a decades-old issue. In the past year, the AllTrials campaign has focused attention ..."