SPORTS-Ill-Considered Decision

efficacy even without ensuring that the drug is safe.
The format and structure of testing procedures have been evolved over decades and have been the cumulative response to drug tragedies in the past. In the 1950s, for instance, the thalidomide disaster led to stricter regulatory procedures in the US, while an earlier disaster in France had already strengthened the European procedures such that these countries were able to avoid the thalidomide tragedy. Between the 1960s and 1970s several other mechanisms were put in place including the Committee on Safety of Medicines in 1970 in the UK. Since the 1960s the World Health Assembly has adopted many resolutions directed at ensuring subjects' safety during the introduction of new drugs. Clinical trial procedures as well as laboratory procedures have been evolved with the consent and approval of the international community of researchers. To overturn it in the interest of the drug companies is to make a mockery of international regulations on the rights of patients.