The therapy being evaluated had already seriously sickened four other participants, though only two incidents were reported to federal officials as required by law. Still, Mr. Gelsinger was injected with the drug. Four days later, he died. The study's lead investigator was a major stockholder in the company sponsoring the research. He has denied wrongdoing, but critics have questioned whether the rush to market a promising new gene therapy colored his judgment.
Most conflicts of interest are far less dramatic.
But financial ties between researchers and drug companies have been clearly shown to skew results. Reviews of industry-sponsored studies comparing one drug to another have shown that an overwhelming majority conclude the sponsoring company's drug is superior. At least twice in recent years, studies that came to the opposite conclusion have been suppressed by the company paying for the study. But that standard has long prevailed. The prestigious New England Journal of Medicine has gone even further.