Researcher to Clarify Ties to Drug Company : Medicine: Journal will follow up UCLA doctor’s editorial on vaccines with statement he is consultant to a firm that makes them.

A prominent UCLA researcher, who wrote an editorial dismissing the likelihood of neurological illness from pertussis vaccines, will publish a clarification noting that he omitted mentioning he is a paid consultant to a vaccine manufacturer.

Dr. James D. Cherry, a professor of pediatrics, agreed to the clarification after the Journal of the American Medical Assn. learned that he failed to make the kind of financial disclosure required of journal authors since last October.

“Dr. Cherry’s financial disclosure was incomplete, and we will be publishing his statement of clarification in the next available issue of JAMA,” John Hammarley, science news editor for the American Medical Assn., said Thursday.

Cherry, a longtime vaccine researcher, is a consultant to Lederle Laboratories, one of two U.S. manufacturers of the diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis (DTP) vaccine. He has also received hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of research grants from Lederle and other firms.

In the editorial, published Friday in the journal, Cherry endorsed the conclusions of a paper published elsewhere in the issue in which researchers at Vanderbilt University studied 38,000 vaccinated children and found no increased risk of seizures. One of the authors of that paper also failed to disclose his ties to Lederle.

Cherry said he chose not to mention his ties to Lederle in the disclosure statement he submitted to the journal. In an interview Thursday, he said he believed such a disclosure was not necessary since the editorial concerned DTP vaccines in general, not one in particular.

“This particular editorial relates in no way to a specific manufacturer, it relates to pertussis vaccine,” Cherry said. “Anybody who has done any research in fields like this has done contract studies with various companies.

“When I signed this thing, I actually thought about it, and I read it sort of carefully because I know this is a sensitive area,” he said. “As it turns out, I did think about this. I thought this is generic, not really specific.”

The issue arose this week when a reporter for a Boston television station learned of Cherry’s ties to Lederle and his failure to declare them. The reporter, with WHDH-TV, contacted Cherry, who says he then contacted the journal.

Since October, the journal has required all authors to identify “any affiliation or financial involvement that may be considered a conflict of interest.” The new policy was prompted by a growing national concern about ethics in biomedical research.

Disclosed information may or may not be published along with the author’s paper. The journal’s editors decide whether the information is important for readers.

Dr. Edward A. Mortimer Jr., a co-author of the Vanderbilt paper, acknowledged Thursday that he, too, failed to disclose he is a paid consultant to Lederle. As with Cherry, he said Lederle pays his university, and the money goes back into research, not into his pocket.

Mortimer, whose case has not been brought before the JAMA editorial board, pointed out that most experts in the field have ties to companies.