WHO refutes accusations that agency submitted to pressure from pharmaceutical companies during handling H1N1 pandemic
June 9th, 2010 - 2:03 am ICT by BNO NewsUNITED NATIONS (BNO NEWS) – The Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) on Tuesday refuted accusations that the agency submitted to pressure from pharmaceutical companies in its handling of the H1N1 pandemic.
An editorial by the British Medical Journal questioned the objectivity of the WHO’s decisions regarding the influenza, saying that it had been advised by experts on the pandemic who were also on the payrolls of drug companies.
Director-General Margaret Chan responded, acknowledging that “potential conflicts of interest are inherent in any relationship between a normative and health development agency, like WHO, and profit-driven industry.”
She noted that the WHO is in the process of establishing and enforcing stricter rules of engagement with the private sector, but stressed that “at no time, not for one second, did commercial interests enter my decision-making.”
She said the decisions to raise the level of pandemic alert were only based only on clearly defined virological and epidemiological criteria. “It is hard to bend these criteria, no matter what the motive.”
She also refuted the implication in the editorial that the “WHO provoked unjustified fear,” emphasizing that “the record is otherwise and not a matter of interpretation.”
“In every assessment of the pandemic, WHO consistently reminded the public that the overwhelming majority of patients experienced mild symptoms and made a rapid and full recovery, even without medical treatment,” she concluded.
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Tags: accusations, bno, british medical journal, commercial interests, conflicts of interest, driven industry, epidemiological, health development agency, implication, influenza, margaret chan, medical treatment, mild symptoms, objectivity, overwhelming majority, pandemic, pharmaceutical companies, private sector, rules of engagement, world health organization
