I did my postdoctoral fellowship at NIH after having completed my PhD in Canada. At that time, the Canadian system hadn't yet been affected by big pharma as in the USA but I'm sure it was getting there. In 1982, when I'd completed my PhD, I had this obvious misunderstanding that one did research to learn new things to push back the lack …
I did my postdoctoral fellowship at NIH after having completed my PhD in Canada. At that time, the Canadian system hadn't yet been affected by big pharma as in the USA but I'm sure it was getting there. In 1982, when I'd completed my PhD, I had this obvious misunderstanding that one did research to learn new things to push back the lack of knowledge; push back the darkness as it were.
So when I went to NIH for my postdoc I was very, very excited indeed! Imagine then my sheer disappointment and disillusionment, to understate things, when I learned that NIH was not the awesome World's centre of research in biomedicine that I'd thought. I learned quickly that you did research there to prove whatever your lab-chief wanted to have you prove, and not to learn anything particularly new or exciting. You did research to prove that his/her pet-theory was correct! Of course in many cases, those pet scientific postulates were aimed at the creation of some patentable item. These included but are not limited to diagnostic tests, new saleable scientific methods/apparatuses, or discoveries that would lead to new patentable drugs (even though said drugs would likely be either ineffective or worse, dangerous to health). If your experiments *didn't* jibe with what the lab-chief wanted, you either went back to square one, or in some cases you might even be chided for obviously not doing something properly. It went on and on. On and on, that is, until someone actually did research OUTSIDE of the NIH at a facility as yet unaffected by pharma and which showed that in fact the 'pet-theory' was patently (pun intended) WRONG. But now that everything is captured by the biopharmaceutical complex this no longer happens; or at least not very often!
In addition to the above, I personally witnessed certain favoured lab members doing junk research, or even if good lab work, they still ended up faking their findings to comport with the 'pet-theory'. I was told to shut up. Let me emphasize that this took place between the years of 1982-1984! Think now how much more corruption is present at NIH and similar institutions like CDC. We are well and truly screwed.
I did my postdoctoral fellowship at NIH after having completed my PhD in Canada. At that time, the Canadian system hadn't yet been affected by big pharma as in the USA but I'm sure it was getting there. In 1982, when I'd completed my PhD, I had this obvious misunderstanding that one did research to learn new things to push back the lack of knowledge; push back the darkness as it were.
So when I went to NIH for my postdoc I was very, very excited indeed! Imagine then my sheer disappointment and disillusionment, to understate things, when I learned that NIH was not the awesome World's centre of research in biomedicine that I'd thought. I learned quickly that you did research there to prove whatever your lab-chief wanted to have you prove, and not to learn anything particularly new or exciting. You did research to prove that his/her pet-theory was correct! Of course in many cases, those pet scientific postulates were aimed at the creation of some patentable item. These included but are not limited to diagnostic tests, new saleable scientific methods/apparatuses, or discoveries that would lead to new patentable drugs (even though said drugs would likely be either ineffective or worse, dangerous to health). If your experiments *didn't* jibe with what the lab-chief wanted, you either went back to square one, or in some cases you might even be chided for obviously not doing something properly. It went on and on. On and on, that is, until someone actually did research OUTSIDE of the NIH at a facility as yet unaffected by pharma and which showed that in fact the 'pet-theory' was patently (pun intended) WRONG. But now that everything is captured by the biopharmaceutical complex this no longer happens; or at least not very often!
In addition to the above, I personally witnessed certain favoured lab members doing junk research, or even if good lab work, they still ended up faking their findings to comport with the 'pet-theory'. I was told to shut up. Let me emphasize that this took place between the years of 1982-1984! Think now how much more corruption is present at NIH and similar institutions like CDC. We are well and truly screwed.