There’s trouble in Cambridge: the Times reports that three Harvard medical researchers have been subpoenaed as part of a Congressional inquiry into unethical ties between medical professionals and the drug industry — specifically, whether antidepressants were improperly marketed. (The commercials are just so convincing!) The report says of Dr. Joseph Biederman, Dr. Thomas Spencer, and Dr. Timothy E. Wilens:

The three researchers have advocated increased use of antipsychotic medicines in children and have accepted lucrative consulting agreements from the drugs’ makers. Senator Charles E. Grassley, an Iowa Republican investigating conflicts of interest in medicine, found that each of the researchers had failed to report much of his consulting income to Harvard. Mr. Grassley has also said that Dr. Biederman and Dr. Wilens might have violated federal and university research rules.

They probably just took consulting money because they were so sure prescribing these meds to kids was a good plan! But, were we in their shoes (and our shoes are significantly less expensive), we’d be less worried about court and more worried about violating the Harvard rules. After all, the planned Medical School expansion in Allston is falling apart at the seams and, you know, they don’t need any more bad press.

Harvard Medical School recently announced that it would loosen its restrictive policies regarding student-media interaction. Called “ill-advised” and “problematic” by Harvard professors themselves, the old policy stated:

All interactions between students and the media should be coordinated with the Office of the Dean of Students and the Office of Public Affairs. This applies to situations in which students are contacted by the media as well as instances in which students may be seeking publicity about a student-related project or program.

Dr. Nancy Oriol, the developer of a guideline that essentially censored HMS students on medical conflicts of interests, continues to insist that the policy’s goal was to “help students, rather than limit speech or control what they say on controversial topics.”

This comes after HMS came under fire for its dubious approach to medical ethics and suspiciously opportunistic professors, including those who served as paid consultants to drug companies and brushed off questioning students who didn’t want to kill their future patients. (HBS is looking less corrupt by the minute.) But in a less than prudent choice of PR action, HMS didn’t even bother submitting its conflict of interest policies for review to the American Medical Student Association last year, promptly receiving the very non-Harvard grade F from the board in 2008.

Read more about the irony of Harvard’s crappy report card after the jump.

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