As long as the drug industry is sponsoring and conducting clinical trials, it's not likely that the public will ever get straight information about the usefulness of drugs. Before the 1980s, independent academic investigators conducted most clinical trials. Today, industry funds nearly two-thirds of all trials. The physicians who enroll patients in these trials not only get financial support for the tests, but often wind up landing lucrative consulting and speaking gigs with the firms when the trials turn out positive.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
I recommend the OA tracking project (OATP) as the best way to stay on top of new OA developments. You can read the OATP feed on a blog-like web page or subscribe to it by RSS, email, or Twitter. You can also help build the feed by tagging new developments you encounter.
