{"id":32431,"date":"2014-10-01T12:38:57","date_gmt":"2014-10-01T11:38:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/?p=32431"},"modified":"2014-10-01T12:38:57","modified_gmt":"2014-10-01T11:38:57","slug":"the-bmj-today-conflicting-interests","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/2014\/10\/01\/the-bmj-today-conflicting-interests\/","title":{"rendered":"The BMJ Today: Conflicting interests"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2014\/08\/Anne_Gulland.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-32218\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2014\/08\/Anne_Gulland.jpg\" alt=\"Anne_Gulland\" width=\"180\" height=\"169\" \/><\/a>As politicians enjoy a glass or two of the hard stuff during this week\u2019s Conservative Party conference, they may like to find time to read <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bmj.com\/content\/349\/bmj.g5452\">a <em>BMJ<\/em> research paper on the impact of minimum alcohol pricing<\/a>, and reflect on government policy in this area.<\/p>\n<p>Prime minister David Cameron has reneged on promises to impose minimum prices, preferring instead a ban on the sale of \u201cbelow cost\u201d drinks. This means that alcoholic drinks cannot be sold for less than the value of tax paid on them. However, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bmj.com\/content\/349\/bmj.g5452\">the paper by Brennan and colleagues<\/a> shows that minimum unit pricing in England would be 40 to 50 times more effective in tackling the problems caused by cheap alcohol than the government\u2019s \u201cbelow cost\u201d policy.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>The findings were based on complex modelling, which boils down to\u00a0two principles: the higher the minimum price the greater the reduction in consumption, and the greater the reduction in consumption, the greater the reduction in harms from alcohol. The model shows that the heaviest drinkers, especially those on low incomes, would benefit most from minimum pricing.<\/p>\n<p>Powerful industry lobbies are <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bmj.com\/content\/349\/bmj.g5892\">also central to a feature in <em>The BMJ<\/em><\/a> on the links of patient groups to drug companies. The feature looks at the Multiple Sclerosis Trust\u2014among other charities\u2014which earlier this year welcomed a decision that the drug nabiximols, which had previously been denied because of its cost, should be available on the NHS in Wales.<\/p>\n<p>The trust failed to reveal that it received \u00a35000 in funding from the German drug company, Bayer, which markets the drug in the UK.\u00a0The only information about drug company funding on the trust\u2019s website is in the form of its annual review.<\/p>\n<p>Drug companies are a source of funding for many patient groups, but there is concern that charities should be more transparent about their financial support. \u201cAnytime any organisation takes money from anybody for any purpose there is potential for a conflict of interest,\u201d Jeremy Taylor, chief executive of National Voices, the national coalition of health and social care charities in England, told <em>The BMJ<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>A lack of transparency is not a problem on <a href=\"http:\/\/doc2doc.bmj.com\/\">doc2doc<\/a>, <em>The BMJ\u2019<\/em>s community site, where debate and discussion are welcomed. Today, doctors are discussing whether <a href=\"http:\/\/doc2doc.bmj.com\/forums\/off-duty_general_should-hospitals-offer-patients-wifi\">free WiFi should be available in hospitals<\/a>, as well as the <a href=\"http:\/\/doc2doc.bmj.com\/forums\/open-clinical_general-clinical_ebola-hit-usa\">first case of Ebola transmitted in the US<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>Anne Gulland <\/strong>is currently community manager on doc2doc.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As politicians enjoy a glass or two of the hard stuff during this week\u2019s Conservative Party conference, they may like to find time to read a BMJ research paper on [&#8230;]<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"btn btn-secondary understrap-read-more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/2014\/10\/01\/the-bmj-today-conflicting-interests\/\">More&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[447,5750],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32431","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-india","category-the-bmj-today"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - 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