Dear Editor,

I am responding as executive producer of the public radio series The Infinite Mind to two issues you raised in your posting of November 25, 2008 regarding the $1.2 million in undisclosed speaking fees paid to the program's host, Dr. Fred Goodwin, by GlaxoSmithKline.

First, I want to respond to your assertion that I "ignored ominous signs" about Goodwin's acceptance of the speaking fees. This is not true. In fact, the staff and I acted affirmatively and diligently at every point to avoid conflicts of interest and to insure the integrity of the program.

Specifically, we were aware that Goodwin, as a leading clinician, researcher and academic, had intersections with the pharmaceutical industry. This included his speaking at pharma-sponsored Continuing Medical Education courses, which are highly regulated with regard to conflicts of interest, and working on pharma-sponsored research, which according to Goodwin and his resume ended in 2001.

In 2006, Goodwin negotiated and signed a contract with The Infinite Mind that contained tough language mandating that he notify us of any potential conflicts, both going back to 1997 and in the future. At the time he signed the agreement, Goodwin disclosed nothing to me or to our attorney, nor did he in the two years following.

In your posting, you also suggest that I was "not just a bit curious" about Goodwin after a May 2008 Slate.com article reported that we failed to disclose the pharmaceutical ties of guests, including the president-elect of the American Psychiatric Association and a leading UCLA researcher, on a program examining FDA warnings on anti-depressants. In fact, I spoke with Goodwin at the time in detail (it may be more appropriate to say that I grilled him in detail). He assured me that he had no conflicts. Nonetheless, I hosted a number of shows while I did additional due diligence. Shortly thereafter, The Infinite Mind went into repeats due to funding. To be clear, despite the claim that I did nothing in response to the Slate.com article in May 2008, we produced no new programs with Fred Goodwin after the Slate article appeared.

As is standard in the journalism industry, we relied on self-disclosure of conflicts of interest. Perhaps one of the takeaway lessons from this situation is that relying on self-disclosure may not be sufficient, and that more aggressive scrutiny may be needed. Consider President Obama's comprehensive disclosure statement for potential staff members that asked for more than 60 documents, as well as for detailed financial information and even links to potential staffers' "Facebook" accounts. Does journalism need an effort this thorough? Perhaps the answer is "yes."

Complicating the situation is that Goodwin says he does not believe there was a conflict of interest. Goodwin told the George Washington University newspaper on December 4, 2008, "I frankly do not see these things as a conflict of interest. It was my judgment . . . Like most experts in my field, I have relationships as a consultant with a number of pharmaceutical companies. I've always thought that if you have multiple relationships they sort of cancel each other out."
British Medical Journal, which reported on December 9, 2008 that "besides GlaxoSmithKline [Goodwin] has been paid by Pfizer, Solvay, Janssen, Eli Lilly, AstraZeneca, and Bristol-Myers Squibb. He said he believed that this canceled out the possible influence of any one company."

If Goodwin himself does not believe there was a conflict of interest due to his novel theory about what constitutes a conflict, that obviously complicated the matter further.

The second point I wanted to respond to is the criticism of The Infinite Mind for accepting unrestricted educational grants from pharmaceutical companies. This is funding that is heavily regulated by federal law and contractual language that prohibits contact between the pharmaceutical company and the recipient of the grant regarding the content of the project.

The Infinite Mind's stated guidelines with regard to pharmaceutical unrestricted educational grants were 1) we limited pharmaceutical funding to 15% of the show's budget; 2) we did not accept the majority of pharmaceutical funding from any one company; and 3) the pharmaceutical funding was combined with the majority of the show's budget that came from blue chip underwriting sources such as the MacArthur Foundation, the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health.

I should note that in 10 years, until the Slate article appeared, the issue of pharmaceutical funding was not raised a single time, by anyone, not station nor listener, even though it was prominently noted on the program.

It should also be said that despite the Slate article's cleaver use of language that made it seem as if the "Prozac Nation: Revisited" program was paid for with pharmaceutical funding, in fact the last pharmaceutical unrestricted educational grant The Infinite Mind received at that point was three years earlier, in 2005.

Bill Lichtenstein
President
LCMedia, Inc. "Creating Media that Matters"
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Cambridge, MA 02142
www.LCMedia.com