President Barack Obama Bend's His Stated Principles of Scientific Integrity. (December 23, 2011)

TFW reported on December 16:

US Senators Call on Secretary Sebelius to Explain the Science Behind Her Plan B Decision. (December 16, 2011)
Thirteen Democratic members of the United States Senate together with one independent on Tuesday wrote to the Secretary of Health and Human Services, Kathleen Sebelius, questioning her decision to overrule a determination by the US Food and Drug Authority (FDA) to allow over-the-counter sales of Plan B, the emergency contraceptive, to girls under 17.

     The overreaching importance of the matter is based on President Obama's 2009 signed statement that decisions in his administration would be based on science, not politics.

Now Nature in its lead editorial this week has taken up the issue reminding the reader that the US president had said when signing the statement in 2009, that his ambition was "about letting scientists like those here today do their jobs, free from manipulation or coercion, and listening to what they tell us, even when it's inconvenient — especially when it's inconvenient".

The day following the overrule by Secretary Sebelius President Obama on being asked by a reporter for his view replied that he concurred and according to Nature added: "as the father of two daughters" he lauded the application of "common sense... The reason Kathleen made this decision was she could not be confident that a 10-year-old or an 11-year-old going into a drugstore, should be able — alongside bubble gum or batteries — to buy a medication that potentially, if not used properly, could end up having an adverse effect. And I think most parents would probably feel the same way."

Below we list the furious rebuttal of Nature's editorialist:

• The most powerful man in the world didn't bother to get the basic facts right.

• The contraceptive, even for non-prescription use, is stored behind the pharmacy counter and not “beside bubble gum and batteries”.

• Never mind the throwback paternalism implied by elevating his own opinion as “the father of two daughters”.

• Note the casual jettisoning of careful and convincing evidence on this contraceptive's safety and effectiveness, even for young adolescents, and their ability to comprehend the labelling.

• With [the concurrence] went his own promise to the thousands of scientists whose hard work and science he had pledged to respect, “especially when it's inconvenient”.

• It certainly is inconvenient -- on the cusp of an election year, in what is at heart a deeply conservative country -- to acknowledge that young adolescents can and do have sex, and that they may not have thought out the potential consequences in advance. So inconvenient, apparently, that the work of the scientists, who spent long hours weighing risks and benefits for the public good, must be thrown under a bus.

• Sebelius's trampling of a drug decision by the FDA is the first in living memory. If it is acceptable for her to override the agency for this year's reasons of political convenience — or, for that matter, for reasons of heartfelt belief — what politically loaded drugs will next come under the axe?

Eugenie Samuel Reich writing in the same issue of Nature notes: "Although the FDA’s decision to allow access had been based on an in-depth scientific review, Sebelius — who is not a scientist by training —claimed that the data did not support the view that young girls would be able to use the drug safely. “The key problem is she re-reviewed the science,” says Francesca Grifo of the Union of Concerned Scientists in Washington DC."

The timing of this overrule by Secretary Sebelius and the President's support for her comes just at the time when the rules for the Administration's departments are to make public their rules on integrity -- they were in fact due by December 17.

Nature surveyed the departments and agencies of the administration and of the 11 that replied "six now have public policies that make some reference to forbidding politically motivated alteration of data. A seventh, the Department of Justice, has told Nature that a working draft does so... three agencies — the Department of Health and Human Services, the Department of Energy and the Department of Defense — have not made their policies public or answered Nature’s questions about them. A fourth agency — the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) — has no public policy but has told Nature that a working draft does not explicitly ban political alteration of data."

Nevertheless, Ms Samuel Reich reports: "some question whether the integrity policies go far enough. It is far from clear, for example, whether such a policy at the Department of Health and Human Services would have prevented the furore over Plan B [and] Nick Steneck, a research ethicist at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, says that the OSTP should offer stronger leadership to make it clear that integrity policies must address political interference. 'Issuing a simple document is not sufficient,' he says".