THE HINDU Editorial Vocabulary- January 1, 2018 - Topic 2

For a wider pool

Clinical trials and the burden of volunteering for them

Clinical trials involving human subjects have long been a flashpoint between bioethicists and clinical research organisations (CROs) in India. Landmark amendments to the Drugs and Cosmetics Act in 2013 led to better protection of vulnerable groups such as illiterate people, but more regulation is needed to ensure truly ethical research. 

While CROs have argued that more rules will stifle the industry, the truth is that ethical science is often better science. The big problem plaguing clinical research is an over-representation of low-income groups among trial subjects. Sometimes CROs recruit them selectively, exploiting financial need and medical ignorance; at other times people over-volunteer for the money. Such over-volunteering occurs more frequently in bioequivalence studies, which test the metabolism of generics in healthy subjects. Because these subjects are well-paid, and get no therapeutic benefit, their only reward from the trial is financial. This results in an incentive to lie about one’s medical history or enrol in multiple trials to maximise one’s income.

Such deception is a risk not only to volunteer health but also to society, because it can throw off the trial’s results. In recent years, several Indian CROs were found by European drug regulators and the World Health Organisation to be fudging bioequivalence data. While such duplicity by a CRO is likely to be found out, volunteer deception, which can impact data as greatly, can slip under the radar. Unsafe drugs can make their way into the market as a result, or safe drugs can get rejected. This is why volunteer honesty is paramount. But how can regulators ensure this? One potential solution is a national registry of trial volunteers, which will alert a CRO when someone signs up for two studies simultaneously. But this will need work, because volunteer privacy cannot be compromised. So regulators need to create a system that anonymises each participant’s data. Another option is to pay volunteers less, taking away the financial incentive to fudge their participation history. But this measure, in isolation, would reduce trial participation dramatically: an unacceptable side-effect because clinical trials are essential to drug research. A third, more sustainable solution is to encourage a wider cross-section of society to participate in research on human subjects. Society at large must realise the valuable service that clinical research subjects perform by making drugs safe for the rest of us. It is imperative that this burden not fall completely on the vulnerable groups. Instead, the educated and affluent, who have greater access to the drugs that emerge from clinical research, must grasp the criticality of this research and pull their weight. Selectiveness in recruiting subjects for clinical trials leads not only to human rights violations but also to bad science. Civil society’s vigilance is vital.

Vocabulary

Flashpoint: a place, event, or time at which trouble, such as violence or anger, flares up.

Example: The flashpoint of the conflagration is just blocks away

Vulnerable: susceptible to physical or emotional attack or harm.

Example: We were in a vulnerable position

Synonyms: helpless, defenseless, powerless, impotent, weak

Antonyms: entrenched, defensible, unassailable, invulnerable, airtight

Stifle: make someone unable to breathe properly; suffocate.

Example: Those in the streets were stifled by the fumes

Synonyms: suffocate, choke, asphyxiate, smother, gag

Antonyms: stimulate, excite

Plague: cause continual trouble or distress to.

Example: The problems that plagued the company

Synonyms: afflict, bedevil, torment, trouble, beset, dog, curse

Antonyms: affection, appreciation, approval, benefit, blessing, delight

Exploit: a bold or daring feat.

Example: The most heroic and secretive exploits of the war

Synonyms: feat, deed, act, adventure, stunt, escapade, achievement

Antonyms: cessation, deliberation, endurance, immobility, inaction, inactivity

Therapeutic: relating to the healing of disease.

Example: Diagnostic and therapeutic facilities

Synonyms: healing, curative, remedial, medicinal, restorative, salubrious

Antonyms: unhealthful

Deception: the action of deceiving someone.

Example: Obtaining property by deception

Antonyms: frankness, guilelessness, honesty, openness, simplicity

Fudge: present or deal with something in a vague, noncommittal, or inadequate way, especially so as to conceal the truth or mislead.

Example: A temptation to fudge the issue and nudge grades up

Synonyms: evade, avoid, dodge, skirt, duck, gloss over, hedge on, prevaricate about

Paramount: more important than anything else; supreme.

Example: The interests of the child are of paramount importance

Synonyms: most important, of greatest/prime importance, uppermost

Antonyms: low-level, subordinate

Simultaneous: occurring, operating, or done at the same time.

Example: A simultaneous withdrawal of all troops

Synonyms: concurrent, happening at the same time, contemporaneous

Antonyms: asynchronous

Imperative: giving an authoritative command.

Example: The bell pealed again, a final imperative call

Synonyms: peremptory, commanding, imperious, authoritative, masterful

Antonyms: Mendicant, Beseeching,  Petitioner,  Precatory,  Imploring,  Supplicant