VIAL

Description

The following segment is relevant to this discussion: "Mr. Speaker, I want to touch on one more additional issue, and that is something called the Brighton Collaboration. I am very concerned about the development of the Brighton Collaboration, which began in the year 2000. This is an international group comprised of public health officials from the CDC, Europe, and world health agencies like WHO and vaccine manufacturers. The first task of the Brighton Collaboration, created several years ago, was to define what constitutes an adverse reaction to a vaccine. They have established committees to work on various adverse reactions to vaccines. Particularly troubling to me is the fact that serving on these panels defining what constitutes an adverse reaction to a vaccine are the vaccine manufacturers. What is even worse is the fact that some of these committees are chaired by vaccine manufacturers. It is inappropriate for a manufacturer of vaccines to be put in the position of determining what is and what is not, an adverse reaction to its product.

Elizabeth Loupi was senior director of Pharmacovigilance, Sanofi Pasteur SA, Lyon, France. Sanofi Pasteur MSD is the only European company dedicated exclusively to vaccines and was founded in 1994, as a joint venture between Sanofi Pasteur and Merck & Co., Inc.

Katz developed a measles vaccine now manufactured by Merck, which also manufactures a Hepatitis B vaccine. Katz said when he was chairman of the committee in 1991 he also worked as a paid consultant for Merck, Wyeth and most major vaccine manufacturers.

No wonder Vittorio Demicheli of the Servizo Sovrazonale di Epidemiologia, Alessandria, Italy, became the lead author of the Cochrane MMR review. The Brighton Collaboration On its Web site (8), The Brighton Collaboration reports: "[It] was founded by Robert Chen, Harald Heijbel, Tom Jefferson, Ulrich Heininger, and Elisabeth Loupi in 1999 at a meeting in Brighton, England. It was officially launched in autumn 2000. The Collaboration consists of volunteers from patient care, public health, scientific, pharmaceutical, regulatory and professional organizations coming from developed and developing countries. They are experienced and knowledgeable in the field of immunization safety and corresponding medical specialties." It says its objectives are: "A. Global Collaboration To establish a global collaboration of professionals and organizations concerned with immunization safety. B. Development To develop a single standardized case definition per AEFI and guidelines for data collection, analysis, and presentation for global use. C. Evaluation To develop and implement study protocols for evaluation of case definitions and guidelines in clinical trials and surveillance systems. D.

He also established the Johns Hopkins Institute for Vaccine Safety, started in part with "unrestricted educational grants in 1997 from several vaccine manufacturers and some private donations," according to Halsey. Congressional investigators said that support included $50,000 in start-up funds from Merck and a payment from Wyeth. Halsey said vaccine manufacturers do not fund the center's vaccine education activities.

Products & services

Similar companies nearby