Here’s another contentious story of an Indian research group feeling left out in the ‘paper run’. A group of researchers from IIT, Madras Chennai has claimed that they lost precious time while trying to get their paper published — it was rejected a couple of times by prestigious publications before another one accepted it. In the meantime, another group of ‘first world scientists’ got a similar paper published by the very same publishers who had rejected the IIT group.

Now, we have heard such stories many times. We have also heard voices of protest and angst that follow such controversies.

While it would be improper to comment on the journal’s decision to reject the paper without weighing the merit of the original draft that was sent for publication, the feeling of ‘third world alienation’ in paper publication has been a seething topic in many developing countries. Researchers have reported similar ‘abandonment’ issues time and again.

I am curious to know if there are more stories like these in our labs. Is it really true that third world scientists do not get as much importance in the peer-review process as their first world cousins? Is there a method to address these issues impartially — a body of peers that investigates into the genuineness of these cries?

Your average modern-day “”https://www.amctv.com/originals/madmen/“>mad man” is more likely to be shilling for medicine than for cigarettes. In 2009, pharmaceutical companies spent around $4.8 billion dollars on direct-to-consumer advertising in the US, according to tracking firm Kantar Media.

Though it has pledged to crack down on misleading drug advertising, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is finding it hard to effectively police the field, especially as marketing campaigns shift to as-yet unregulated platforms like Twitter, which leaves little space for cautionary blurbs about side-effects.

And there’s still some questionable drug marketing being conducted offline, too.

A report from Reuters describes how, in 2009, Bayer Healthcare invited a group of young mothers to a Tupperware party-style brunch that featured a nurse who extolled the virtues of Mirena, an intrauterine device (IUD) that just happens to be manufactured by Bayer:

“Here you have a company hiring a third-party to invite people into a home like a Tupperware party,” Thomas Abrams, director of the FDA division that oversees drug advertising and communications, told Reuters. “That was extremely, extremely concerning to us because this product has risks — risk of infection, loss of fertility. Huge risk.” The nurse reportedly did not mention any of Mirena’s potentially harmful side effects at the party.

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