If patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel, then news about news is the last refuge of a desperate editor. In an editorial in the BMJ this week, Ben Goldacre and Carl Heneghan report on ‘extensive news coverage’ of a ‘leaked letter’ from the Chief Medical Officer to the Academy of Medical Sciences asking for an enquiry into how society should judge the safety and efficacy of drugs. This is hardly the stuff of which crackling headlines are made. Dr No missed it, and so too did most of the media. According to google news, only the BBC and The Guardian covered the story in the national media, with remaining coverage confined to such erstwhile journals as the PharmaTimes of Freakistan. The leak, it turns out, was about as newsworthy as a damp patch on an incontinent’s mattress.
