From BP to Avandia: Public Citizen's media hits roundup
As government officials try to get to the bottom of who is to blame for the massive BP oil spill, Public Citizen has been featured in top media coverage of the catastrophe. Tyson Slocum, Public Citizen’s Energy Program director, has become a go-to guy on the issue, being interviewed on radio and television networks across the country. Slocum was featured on Bloomberg TV’s “Inside Track,” SiriusXM/POTUS radio talking about the government’s reaction to the spill and CBS Radio’s “The John Carney” show about BP’s history of safety records. He noted that BP has “one of the worst safety records of any oil company operating in America.”
Slocum made headlines in Canada and Cuba, as well. Slocum has been featured in a variety of articles from coast to coast including The New York Times and Los Angeles Times. Public Citizen also has been quoted on the issue by Reuters, Albany Times Union, Politico, The Washington Independent, The NACS, “The People’s Voice,” 2TheAdvocate.com and The Palestine Telegraph.
Also making headlines is Public Citizen calling on the Food and Drug Administration to stop the risky trail of GlaxoSmithKline’s diabetes drug, Avandia. The drug is believed to put patients at risk for heart attack and chest pain.
As Sidney Wolfe, director of Public Citizen’s Health Research Group, wrote in a letter to the FDA, which was quoted in a Reuters article:
The Avandia trial is “exposing thousands of high-risk patients with diabetes to a drug with an unfavorable safety profile and no clinical advantage over its comparator.”
Public Citizen’s efforts to stop the trial have gained international attention. Sidney Wolfe was quoted on CBC across Canada as well as in a Metro Canada Toronto story on the trial. The story gained attention in parts of Europe and was featured on Pharmacy Europe, a website for European hospitals and clinical pharmacists. Back in the States, Public Citizen was quoted in the Los Angeles Times, Post Chronicle, National Post, Business Spectator, and msnbc.com.
Public Citizen has also made headlines with many other issues including, the climate bill, Capitol Hill’s limits on lobbying and Florida’s doctor discipline system. Keep checking back for more!