Richard C Eastman

"Subject No. 4" died at 1:44 a.m. on June 14, 1999, in the immense federal research clinic of the National Institutes of Health. The cause of death was clear: a complication from an experimental treatment for kidney inflammation using a drug made by a German company, Schering AG. Among the first to be notified was Dr. Stephen I. Katz, the senior NIH official whose institute conducted the study. Unbeknown to the participants, Katz also was a paid consultant to Schering AG.

Calling the issues "serious," Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Los Angeles) has posed detailed questions to the head of the National Institutes of Health concerning the financial ties between the government's top diabetes researcher and a major pharmaceutical company. In a letter to Dr. Harold E.

The director of the National Institutes of Health said Tuesday that he has requested an internal review of the financial ties between the federal government's top diabetes researcher and a major pharmaceutical company. Dr. Harold E. Varmus, the NIH director, said he wants the institutes' office of inspector general to examine "whether any violation of law and/or regulations occurred."

In June 1996, a lawyer at the Department of Health and Human Services was reviewing financial statements filed each year by senior federal officials when one disclosure form caught his attention. The government's top diabetes researcher reported taking money from the Warner-Lambert Co. while, in his official capacity, directing a nationwide test of a diabetes pill produced by the firm's drug unit, Parke-Davis.