Alzheimer's Club

According to the Alzforum web site, "Alzheimer Research Forum's 10th Anniversary Symposium: Mapping the Next Decade of Alzheimer Research" to be held July 19, 2006 at the Centro de Convenciones, Madrid, Spain as an ancillary event at the International Conference on Alzheimer's Disease 2006.

With this regard, ARF web site says the following: "Ten years ago, the Alzheimer Research Forum was formally launched in Osaka, Japan, at the ICADRD. To mark this milestone, you are invited to attend our symposium on "Mapping the Next Decade of Alzheimer Research." The symposium asks participants to consider key advances in Alzheimer disease research from the past decade and look forward in a bold attempt to craft a research agenda for the next 10 years. Our speakers will form teams and prepare short presentations in which they will attempt to synthesize major findings in several overlapping subject areas relevant to AD. The teams will work on their presentations in advance, and can choose to post drafts on Alzforum and invite suggestions from the community. In Madrid the discussion leaders will lead a group brainstorming session aimed at drafting a research roadmap for the next decade. We want to challenge the field to integrate findings and draw significant consensus toward building inclusive hypotheses that explain more fully the pathogenesis of this complex disease."

One of the apparent challenges Alzforum fools its' forum members and International Alzheimer's Conference participants with, is naming Harvard's Selkoe a chair of the ARF Anniversary Simposium. This is because ARF assists Selkoe to hide his competing financial interests.

Sadly, present "ARF Voluntary [Conflict of Interest] Disclosure Policy for Contributors" does nothing to protect Alzheimer's field from severe corruption by Selkoe and others, because "the disclosure is not mandatory". ARF says that disclosure "form allows members to disclose any competing financial interests that, through their potential influence on behavior or content or from perception of such potential influences, could undermine the objectivity, integrity or perceived value of a posting on the ARF website." However, Selkoe did not provide the disclosure of the conflicts at his ARF member page, consistent with the conflicting lie that he makes every effort to diclose his conflict, or, contrary, fooling Nature editors and Nature readers (right at a time he signed another contract with Elan) that he has no conflict at all.

It was previously reported in a number of publications (Science SAGE KE contribution "Amyloid beta road show, or Has the lure of profits corrupted Alzheimer’s neuroscience?", "Open letter to Donald Kennedy, Science Editor-in-Chief: AAAS, Science, Alzheimer’s disease and academic dishonesty", BMJ's "Ethical conundrums: an Alzheimer's case", letter to Neuron editor "Hasta la vista, amyloid cascade hypothesis, OR will academic dishonesty yield Alzheimer's cure?", UK Parliamentary inquiry on Scientific publications, memorandum from Alexei R Koudinov, "Open letter to president G W Bush on conduct by Scientists, STM journals and Scientific Institutions") that Selkoe serves a director of Elan Pharmaceuticals, that he was in preslamp sales of his Elan shares (months before the failure of his amyloid theory-based vaccination treatment of Alzheimer's was reported in open scientific literature, but right after the patient deteriorated in a UK clinic). Selkoe contract with Elan signed in April 2002, as well as his earlier contract with Athena Neurosciences), are publicly available.

In case of proper investigation by US Securities and Exchange Commission , UK Governmental Serious Fraud Office, and Office of Research Integrity of the US Department of Health and Human Services, Selkoe could face imprisonment, criminal fine and a ban from doing scientific research, a well deserved measure for those who forget about patients and put their private interest above all. For a sad story of one such patient see the article "Goodbuy came early". Another patient story and its time match with Selkoe sales of Elan shares is available at Section 2.14 of the UK Parliamentary publication.

ARF says their Anniversary Symposium to "offer a chance to think about the big picture [of Alzheimer's], in a lively, collegial atmosphere". Could it be collegial when an Alzheimer's "star" in a symposium discussion leader chair could well be not duly punished criminal? Think about it. It is a big question, will he be talking for the science and patients, or for his company and his million-dollar stake in the amyloid hypothesis he invented.

Selkoe is a prototype of a corrupted Harvard professor, a godfather of the network of international science criminals in the to-be-released semi-fiction mystery novel "The Alzheimer's Code". In this story, the death of the President of the United States of America is followed by his preventive anti-amyloid vaccination against Alzheimer's disease. At the same time and for the same reason, in his agony of death Editor-in-Chief of London-based Nature recalls he in fact witnessed the corruption of Alzheimer's pseudo-science, brought to the community by a keen student.