Medical transparency?

Drug companies have been required since 1 January to record any payments to doctors with a view to this becoming publicly searchable knowledge from July 2016. Writing in NLJ this week, Leigh Day solicitor Sarah Moore says the new code aims to encourage transparency, but she questions how successful the initiative will be. Doctors can formally opt out, she notes, while neither private hospitals nor medical device companies are covered by the requirement. Most crucially, she says, the code is voluntary.