In a bid to fend off its critics, Roche is offering to establish a multi-party advisory board to review all data for its Tamiflu influenza medication. The board would consist of experts from academia and private institutions, who would then agree on which analyses were useful in assessing the appropriate role that Tamiflu should have in aiding public health. “We think that would be an appropriate, fair and transparent way of handling this debate,” Daniel O’Day, who heads the Roche pharma business told Reuters late last week. “To what level data will be shared proactively and constantly is something we need to discuss.” His remarks were made on the eve of a workshop that was held by the European Medicines Agency to promote transparency and greater disclosure of clinical trial data (read here), and also followed a recent call for a boycott of Roche medicines by a prominent researcher over the issue. And earlier this month, the British Medical Journal announced a new policy that studies will not be published unless drugmakers provide more patient-level trial data. The new policy, which goes into effect in January 2013, came in the wake of a controversy over such data for Tamiflu.
