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K.F. Etzold, Your point came up in the Kentucky hearing, raised by the judge, and it's a reasonable one. The patients' attorney's response was that [if a patient waived his right to sue and then turned around and tried to sue anyway] he couldn't see a court ruling in the patient's favor under those circumstances and said, "that can't be the reason for the withholding."[meaning that was an unacceptable reason] Paula Wittekind ----- Original Message ----- From: "K. F. Etzold" <[log in to unmask]> To: <[log in to unmask]> Sent: Thursday, July 21, 2005 11:54 PM Subject: Re: Editorial: patient choice in clinical trials > Linda J Herman wrote: > >>Many PWP feel strongly that we must never allow another pharmaceutical to >>treat human subjects in this unethical manner again. We will continue to >>do whatever we can to convince Amgen to reinstate treatment for the >>current trial patients and to further develop GDNF for other patients or >>allow another company to do so. There is substantial evidence that GDNF >>works -- and it might be available alot sooner than other treatment >>methods that are still in pre-clinical stages today. >> >> >> > There is another side to this: A drug company has to be very careful of > how it makes experimental > Drugs available. Let us say they would agree to make GDNF available to > PD patients because > they felt it was the right thing to do. Let us also assume that the > company would require a waiver > from the patients. Sounds good so far. But now, after several months > severe side effects show up > and some of the patients decide to sue the company, just as they are > suing now, but in the opposite > direction. It is likely that the patients would win the suit despite > the waivers. > This would be an unacceptable risk for the company, which is probably > why they are taking such a hard line. Especially since there appears to > be reason to be cautious > based on the test evidence (which may not be complete). But the courts > would certainly look at that > and conclude that the company was reckless, and that the patients > deserve monetary compensation. > It would also reflect badly on the public image of the company. > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: > mailto:[log in to unmask] > In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn