Panel Challenges NIH Handling of Rules Violations

"This is the largest scandal in all of the NIH's existence," said Rep. Edward Whitfield (R-Ky.), chairman of the House Energy and Commerce subcommittee on investigations. To which NIH Deputy Director Raynard S. Kington nodded and replied, "We certainly hope it will be the last."

Citing internal ethics investigations over the last three years, Kington said the agency had disciplined 34 NIH scientists who had violated conflict-of-interest rules. Six scientists were suspended or placed on probation and the others were admonished orally or by letter, according to NIH documents.

NIH officials also assured the panel that they had recommended the termination of two other senior scientists who accepted drug company money without obtaining required advance approval.

"When violations were found, NIH implemented sanctions ranging from oral admonishments to letters of reprimand to suspensions," Kington told the subcommittee. "In all cases where individual scientists failed to take [personal] leave to conduct outside activities, they were directed to pay back that leave to the government."

But Kington's assurances were challenged by Republicans and Democrats on the subcommittee. They noted that despite previous statements of concern and outrage from senior NIH officials, no employee had been fired, and they said most of the disciplinary actions had been tepid.

The session marked the sixth congressional hearing since January 2004 that centered on NIH conflicts of interest.

"This is really an ethical Potemkin village, where a hollow system appears to provide the illusion of integrity, but transgressors never leave," said Rep. Joe L. Barton (R-Texas), chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee.

Much of the contentious afternoon session focused on two researchers: Dr. P. Trey Sunderland III, a geriatric psychiatrist who has researched Alzheimer's disease, and Dr. Thomas J. Walsh, who has researched fungal diseases in cancer patients.

Their cases are pending before an administrator at the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, a uniformed branch of the service. A resolution of Sunderland's case has been delayed because of a separate investigation by the U.S. Justice Department, Bush administration officials said.