Easy money for City human guinea pigs

By Vaidehi Sachin
Poverty and greed, dragging city youth and housewives for clinical trials.
Mumbai’s huge illiterate population is in danger of being misused by unethical firms to test suspect drugs-this time helping in the search for a cure for various diseases. poor susceptible to pharmaceutical giants Lured by the money being offered by dozens of international pharmaceutical companies carrying out clinical trials, human guinea pig
Sarita, house wife, residing at Borivali lend her body to get tested sixth drug-this time helping in the search for a cure for asthma. While speaking to this paper she said “I am not educated enough to get some good employment, my husband has deserted me long back I have three growing children, I am the only earning member. Twice a month I help these medicine Companies to conduct clinical trial on my body, they pay me minimum 6 to 7 thousand. Per month I earn more than fifteen thousand. Some times these trials lead to side effects, but what to do? This earning is better than flesh trading.”
She further said its not only needy people, even college students come here, and after the age of eighteen any one can lend their body for clinical trial”. When asked she refused to disclose the location and company name.
She said most of us, has no knowledge at all about the drugs we have allowed doctors to introduce into our body over the past two years. For now, she has no regrets.
Every year there are so many volunteers they die or become disable due to overdose of tested samples.

When asked State Health Minister Rajendra Shingne he told this paper “foreign drug companies taking advantage of poverty and recession. This is serious issue; I am not much aware of this problem but will soon definitely look into the same. He has also appealed people to make immediate police complaint if they come across such companies.”
1000's of volunteers who are driving nascent clinical research industry, which has attracted global pharmaceutical firms.
According to a report by consultants McKinsey and Co, the city clinical research industry can earn revenues of some thousand millions by 2010, at which time the country will need 50,000 professionals and about 300,000 'subjects' or patients.

Dr Mohanti a Critic say “ not only Mumbai but India's huge illiterate population is in danger of being misused by unethical firms to test suspect drugs. But industry officials say each trial follows a strict code of ethics. Government has banned clinical trial on human body but it is never implemented”. These kind payments made to their human guinea pigs are so attractive generally no one reports against these research institutes.”

The volunteers undergo health tests such as blood, urine, chest X-rays and heart check-up. If they fail research institute do not enroll them for the test. Under Indian laws, only testing of new and generic drugs which have gone off patent and are manufactured in the country are permitted. All other pre-clinical trials, except those on rodents, are banned.

But as soon as pre-clinical trials on animals are over in a foreign country and the new drug has been tested on healthy volunteers in that nation, the drug can be used in India for so-called second and third phase trials.

Industry officials say it costs upwards of US$1 billion to make a new drug, with clinical trials accounting for almost two-thirds of the cost. Carrying out trials in India can cut costs by more than 55 percent, due to cheap and skilled scientific manpower and the availability of volunteers.

Department of Medical ethics has already published in their literature guide that “government should have some provision, to investigate such rackets and save their country men but such provision is not available. Moreover corrupt system can never create deterrence in such clinical laboratories.”
As a rule, studies that involve invasive medical procedures are more lucrative—the more uncomfortable, the better the pay—and in this study subjects had a fibre-optic tube inserted in their mouths and down their esophagus’s so that researchers could examine their gastrointestinal tracts.
Volunteers are paid not to do things but to let things be done to them.