“One in seven UK based scientists or doctors has witnessed colleagues intentionally altering or fabricating data during their research or for the purposes of publication.”—BRITISH MEDICAL JOURNAL, BRITAIN.
How prevalent is scientific fraud? The world’s largest general scientific society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, recently sent surveys on this subject to 1,500 members. Of the 469 scientists who responded, 27 percent “believe they have encountered or witnessed fabricated, falsified, or plagiarized research over the past 10 years,” according to Science magazine. Only 2 percent believe that fraud is on the decline; 37 percent feel that it is on the rise. Of those who had encountered fraud, 27 percent said they had done nothing about it, and only 2 percent had publicly challenged the data they suspected as phony. As to the causes of all the fraud, the scientists listed many, such as the fierce competition to publish findings first and obtain government grants and public recognition.
Kickbacks, fraud and misconduct are rife among American medical researchers, according to a scathing critique published by a US Congressional committee. The report says that the National Institutes of Health has ‘endangered public health’ by failing to police the scientists it supports.”—New Scientist, September 15, 1990.
The American Medical News said: “Peer-reviewed journals, once regarded as almost infallible, have had to admit that they are incapable of eradicating fraud.” “Peer review has been oversold,” said a medical writer and columnist for The New York Times.
“For high-octane gall in proclaiming its ethical purity, the scientific community has long been the runaway winner,” said New Scientist magazine. The highly vaunted peer-review system that theoretically screens out all the cheats is felt by many to be a farce. “The reality,” New Scientist said, “is that few scientific scoundrels are caught, but, when they are, they frequently turn out to have been running wild for years, publishing faked data in respectable journals, with no questions asked.”
Previously, an official of the NIH said, as reported in The New York Times: “I think an age of innocence has ended. In the past people assumed that scientists didn’t do this kind of thing. But people are beginning to realize that scientists are not morally superior to anybody else.” The Times report added: “Although a few years ago it was rare for the National Institutes of Health to receive one complaint a year of alleged fraud, she said, there are now at least two serious allegations a month.” Science magazine observed: “Scientists have repeatedly assured the public that fraud and misconduct in research are rare . . . And yet, significant cases seem to keep cropping up.”
The chairman of one of the congressional investigating committees, John Dingell, at one time said to scientists: “I will tell you that I find your enforcement mechanisms are hopelessly inadequate and that rascality seems to be triumphing over virtue in many incidences in a fashion that I find totally unacceptable. I hope you do too.”
The NOVA program on “Do Scientists Cheat?” concluded with this acknowledgment by one of the scientists present: “Skeletons have to come out of the closets, bureaucrats’ careers have to be impaired if that’s what it takes, and there’s no alternative. This is ethically required, this is legally required, and it’s certainly morally required.”
