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Senate Finance Committee Wants Answers From Former GSK Exec

November 26, 2007

Two senior members of the Senate are seeking an interview with Tadataka Yamada, the former chairman of R&D for GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), to discuss his role in the alleged intimidation of John Buse, a professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill who raised concerns in 1999 about cardiovascular risks associated with Avandia.

Sens. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), the chairman and ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, recently entered a report in the Congressional Record they say details how GSK employees allegedly intimidated the scientist. The committee has jurisdiction over the Medicare and Medicaid programs.

In a letter to Yamada, the senators requested that he schedule a meeting with committee staff by the end of the month to “enhance the committee’s understanding of the facts” surrounding the allegations of intimidation. “Based upon documents received by the committee from GSK and others, it appears that, in your position as chairman of research and development at GSK, you played a significant role in developing and implementing GSK’s strategy for dealing with Dr. Buse’s public airing of his concerns about cardiovascular risks associated with Avandia,” they wrote.

Yamada, who currently heads the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s Global Health Program, retired from GSK last year. A representative for Yamada said the former GSK executive did not intimidate the researcher or direct subordinates to do so. He expects to schedule a meeting with committee staff shortly.

The meeting is part of the committee’s ongoing investigation into the Type 2 diabetes treatment Avandia (rosiglitazone maleate). Physician labeling for the drug recently was updated with a revised boxed warning, and GSK has agreed to conduct a clinical trial comparing the safety of Avandia with other oral diabetes medicines.