The
government’s and court’s recent knee jerk decision to clamp down on clinical
research in the country is likely to prove regressive in the long run, for if
there is one single factor that keeps modern medicine ahead of other systems,
it is new discoveries and innovations fuelled by the indomitable spirit of
research.
Heart diseases for instance can now be
prevented by new drugs that lower cholesterol orprevent stickiness of clot-forming
platelets, which are getting better by the day, thanks to research. Narrowed or
blocked arteries of the heart can now be opened up by balloons or stents
inserted through the hand, thanks again to bold research. Further, the occluded
arteries can also be “bypassed” surgically using grafts or conduits, as our
present prime minister’s health bears testimony to, as a consequence of daring
experimentation by bold heart surgeons 30 years ago.
What
has made these “advances”possible however has been years of painstaking
research, initially in laboratories, then in animal labs and finally in human
subjects. And if the terms “research” and “clinical trial” evokes creepy
feelings of cold inhuman experimentation, remember that the benefits we enjoy
today would not have come otherwise.There must have been a “first few’ who went
under these therapies that were once “experimental”.
As a
corollary, the lack of research has made several systems that once had their
day in the sun, become obsolete. In the second century, lived a great Roman
physician called Claude Galen, whose observations and teachings reached
historical heights and his potions made from herbs became the treatment of that
day. The next hundred years witnessed the blind practice of what Galen had
written with no new research or additions. Progress soon came to a stand-still
and history now looks back at this period as the Dark Age of western
medicine. Our Indian systems of
medicine, once rich and flourishing, have also been plagued by lack of new
research.
Hepatitis
B infection, a leading cause of liver failure and liver cancer, that had no
remedy till the mid-eighties, now has 6 good medicines and an effective vaccine
for prevention, thanks to medical research. Hepatitis C infection which has
only the expensive and toxic injections of interferon by way of therapy today,
is all set to see the launch of several effective “oral” drugs that could
transform its treatment in a couple of years,. But how will they come into our
arsenal unless tested on patients and found to be effective?
Needless
to say, medical research needs to meet high standards of ethics, care and
safety, and be transparent and accountable.But research needs encouragement and
promotion if medicine has to continue its advancement. Banning it would halt its
progress and take us back to the Dark Ages!
As published in HT City ( Hindustan Times) dated 13th January, 2013.
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