UD‘s buddy Bill Gleason reminds us that the business of pharmaceutical companies paying professors to write books – or to put their names on books written by ghost-writing companies – continues to thrive. (Pharma also has professors put their names on articles largely or entirely written by the same ghost-writing companies.) Like all ghostly things, this one leads a fitful existence; occasionally there’s a reported sighting. But you can’t be sure you’ve seen a ghost until you get documentation, and in this case, people have been trying to get documentation out of the American Psychiatric Association, which published the book…
On May 4, there’ll be a day-long workshop, at the University of Toronto, on the ethics of ghostwriting. David Healy will be there, along with other academics who’ve been willing to go up against powerful and rich vested interests, inside the university and out.