Danishefsky + Rebek = ?
by Phil on Jun 18 2008 (34561 Views)I recently wrote about the reaction of isonitriles with carboxylic acids under microwave irradiation, as reported by Danishefsky. Rebek's group took up this idea and tried the reaction inside capsules formed by two cavitands (DOI:10.1021/ja802288k).
In the presence of the capsule, acid 1 and isonitrile 2 react at room temperature to give the intermediate 3. However, the n-butyl intermediate 3a is not detected and immediately rearranges to the product 4a, still trapped inside the capsule. Release of the intermediate and reaction with 1 in the bulk solution gives a small amount of 5a (this side product gets trapped in a capsule again).
In the case of isopropyl substitution, intermediate 3b is actually seen by NMR. It cannot rearrange to product 4b, but is released from the capsule instead and reacts with 1 to give formamide 5b. The authors explain this with the steric bulk of the isopropyl group that prevents the rearrangement inside the capsule.
As far as I know, this is the first experimental evidence for intermediates of the type of 3, which take part in the reaction mechanism suggested by Danishefsky. In addition, it also shows that the carboxylic acid - isonitrile reaction can be "catalyzed" by cavitands without the need for microwave irradiation.
nifty science. too bad about the disingenuousness that emanates from MSKCC.
TO: Human Resources, Employee Relations, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC)
RE: Sloan Policy on Conflict of Interest [COI]/clinical trials
FROM: Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory, Sloan-Kettering Institute
Please clarify Sloan’s policies relative to the following Conflict of Interest [COI]/ethics issues: On occasion [e.g. when an article appears in the lay press] an intuitive (and persistent cancer) patient (or their proxy) accesses the Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory via phone, seeking information about (and participation in) epothilone clinical trials conducted at MSKCC. In the past the non-clinician Ph.D. Administrative Manager [AM] (Dr. Sarah Danishefsky, the spouse of the Principal Investigator [PI, also a Professor of Chemistry at Columbia University]) of the high profile Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory has instructed a junior, but not direct report to keep secret (withhold/embargo) known information relative to the availability of clinical trials conducted at MSKCC on a (Bristol Myers Squibb [and/or possibly Novartis’] developed epothilone derivative) drug candidate(s) that compete(s) directly with an epothilone analogue candidate that emanates from the Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory, in variance with the above-mentioned queries and the fact that the AM had actually apprised her coworker that a clinical trial on the competitor’s drug candidate(s) was or were commencing (or had commenced) at Sloan and then instructed him to embargo this information. The AM subsequently attempted to cloak her motives by stating “ours are better than theirs,” invoking early, at that point unverified comparative in-vitro and/or in-vivo data points (supplied by a colleague whose scientific methodology had been questioned on more than one occasion by disparate, mutually exclusive researchers, (grant and other) administrators and/or industrial courtship candidates who did not know of each other’s concerns about the Sloan colleague researcher). At that point in time the Bioorganic’s candidate was ~ an estimated 1 year from the start of a proposed and hoped for clinical trial (which has apparently since begun [off site, and possibly at Sloan]). The lab had smarted, being bested (and dropping out of a front-runner position) in a high profile natural product synthesis race when a staff process chemist charged with supplying an already solved piece of the puzzle for subsequent, forging ahead iterations of the synthesis attempt reportedly used the wrong racemer of a reagent that was not checked appropriately by the A team prior to utilization, dooming an otherwise successful virtually complete synthesis to failure. Germane is a financially significant, development / rights purchase of a Bioorganic Laboratory epothilone drug candidate by Roche via Kosan (its licensee) [since abandoned by Roche, Kosan recently being purchased by BMS]. Although one can understand the premise of not promoting a competitor’s product, that business tenet would clearly not be applicable in this situation at Sloan. Though warned on more than one occasion to not report these problems by Sloan employees the Sloan employee felt uncomfortable misleading seemingly desperate cancer patients or their proxies and always referred these queries to either the MSKCC Physician Referral help line or to administrators or nurse clinicians affiliated with the clinician under whose aegis the BMS [and/or possibly the Novartis] trial (and possibly, now, the Bioorganic candidate’s study) is apparently conducted at Sloan) for proper vetting. That the Administrative Manager would place her own potential financial successes and results above the content of the character of the Sloan-Kettering Institute may not be a surprise. That she instructed (and expected me) her coworker to abet this initiative was out of line and evidence of a lack of respect for the Institute and for her coworker, who did not think that the AM would go so low as to expect him to do her dirty work or for her to drop her guard to the point that she’d expose herself, the lab and Sloan to this type of ethics liability, considering that the Bioorganic compound(s) might very well prove to be the best of the epothilone class, after proper clinical trial vetting. Such a tack, if followed would be in variance with that espoused [by Varmus, Nurse, Mendelsohn and/or Abeloff] on the “Titans of Cancer” television special. The Sloan employee's parent’s first child died of complications from childhood leukemia at Memorial Hospital two years before he was born. A child with this affliction today stands a good chance of survival due in no small part to the therapeutic advances fomented at Sloan and other like-minded Institutions, yet if the above-mentioned bio-ethically challenged tack were allowed to continue unchecked, it would tarnish the otherwise important science and medicine that emanates from MSKCC and instead of properly steeling hope, Sloan Kettering would merely be stealing hope, one clinical trial enrollee at a time. There is a difference between proudly standing behind one’s brilliant work product and bending the rules when convenient for oneself, especially when lives may be in the balance and when the professionals bending rules are people and/or Institutions who clearly know better and who claim to be standard bearers of higher ethical practice. A US Army General (possibly a War-College dean/affiliate) has stated (I paraphrase) that Harvard MBA candidates learn to overcome ethics while pursuing a profit. Such an MO may be in variance with the COI and ethics policies of MSKCC. The above mentioned instance of craven self-servitude is coupled with other episodes of intermittently palpable disingenuousness at Sloan (e.g. that the AM is considered a “full time” employee, yet is often on campus at most perhaps 50% time and has had the temerity to complain during work hours via phone from off-campus that she could not check her stocks, peculiar acts of self promotion (e.g.: arranging for one’s own nomination for scientific accolades, the PI penning a nomination for himself for the Nobel in his own longhand on the nomination form] and acting surprised and naive when awarded them, including a prize from the very company [BMS] on the short end of the AM’s conflicted interest [though the PI once stated that if [the President of the MD Anderson Center] won that award, that he didn’t want it]), a protégé professor who fellowshipped in the Bioorganic Lab involved in his own hubris inspired imbroglio (retraction of multiple tenure facilitating papers and allegations of having an affair with a student and of her “irreproducible” data); the Bioorganic PI had reportedly been barred from consulting at a branch of a NJ based major pharmaceutical company, concerns about the efficacy of laboratory notebook record keeping and the egregious physical plant shortcomings at the Institute (a confluence of bizarre design, building/construction and facilities management flaws in the RRL laboratory building that intermittently, inappropriately render the RRL a toxic firetrap [whose cover-up (and the ruse invoked while duping a rightfully concerned local community, the community board and the city relative to systemic infrastructure problems in the RRL and safety issues at MSKCC that affect employee and community safety) allowing for the hurdling of impediments to the squirming construction of the new/replacement Sloan research tower and the granting of a zoning variance has included the conjuring and synchronizing of cover stories (as well as threats against employees who appropriately report environmental health and safety (EH&S) problems at Sloan) by MSKCC (facilities management and other Sloan administrators). [Sloan's Facilities team is currently headed by VP, Ed Mahoney and is represented by attorney Shelly Friedman while attempting to assuage a rightly concerned local community relative to safety issues] Sloan had to previously abandon a building due to facilities/infrastructure problems that allowed for its employees to be exposed to poisonous carbon monoxide]; these and other infrastructure problems affect reaction conditions and therefore stand to impeach the credibility of research conducted at Sloan (e.g.: cross contamination between supposedly mutually exclusive fume hoods reported by circumspect researchers, ductwork whose controls were unfathomably, yet knowingly, not installed properly by MSK, water leaking through live electrical light fixtures). It has also been reported that the PI of the Bioorganic Laboratory has attempted to leverage (to the point of irritating) the clinician overseeing clinical trials at Sloan to continue and/or increase enrollment in a trial of the above-mentioned bioorganic drug candidate in variance with the clinician’s concerns about the bioorganic drug candidate’s efficacy and patient safety. This is significant because very large milestone dependent royalty payments are contingent upon continued enrollment of patients and/or completion of a clinical trial’s “Phase.” A high profile researcher/clinician (a deputy physician in chief) at Sloan was arrested following an SEC investigation for insider (Imclone) stock trading; The former physician in chief committed suicide; Off-scale windfall profits have been available to biotech company insiders at Sloan, perhaps their fortunate tipees (e.g.: Ariad [stock ticker: Aria] whose stock price jumped one hundred (100) times or ten thousand (10,000) percent during a relatively short ~ five (5) month period (10/99-3/00) following assuaging of a “buy” impediment [the former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, pardoned by President Clinton, has sat on the Board of Ariad]) and perhaps fortunate future tipees, were this type of lightning to strike again. Although the honest application of the forces of commerce (monetary reward for brilliant and properly vetted hard work) are appropriate, inappropriate leverage by a powerful non-clinician possibly resulting in someone being a pawn so that a non-clinician or the Institute could receive a royalty payment that lay in the balance, or the embargoing of known information about the availability of competitors’ clinical trial drug candidates conducted at MSKCC are likely not. Congress has investigated the National Institutes of Health (NIH) relative to ethics/conflict of interest concerns (e.g.: the National Cancer Institute’s (NCI’s) erstwhile Director). So who’s minding the store and who can a desperate cancer sufferer trust if the guardians are equally or more concerned with their own stock portfolios than patient safety and drug efficacy? The Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center has stated: “Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” Some of these issues have been broached in the New York Times, The New York Observer, other press publications and even Michael Moore’s movie “Sicko.” For the protection of the Institute, in these times of heightened corporate, medical and pharmaceutical industry scrutiny and accountability, given that the research conducted in the Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory is funded in part by government (e.g.: NIH RO1 [discovery] and RAID [scale-up for industrial development (the NIH researcher/administrator who vetted the Sloan epothilone candidate prior to award of an NIH RAID grant has interestingly since sat on the Board of Kosan)]) grants and philanthropic (e.g.: MSKCC Major Donor) sources and that MSKCC is reviewed (and accredited) by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Hospital Organizations (JCAHO), please clarify Sloan’s policy relative to the ethics/conflict of interest awkwardness discussed in this note. One ought to be wary whether a greeting offered by Sloan to a cancer sufferer (especially one who is recruited to join a [lab to clinic] “translational” experimental study) is a compassionate smile or a smirk and whether Sloan is a leader in the fight against cancer or merely a cog in the “cancer racket.” There is a connection between the EH&S and ethics problems as potential and/or realized profit has affected the non-addressment of systemic environmental health and safety issues at Sloan. Has Sloan conjured and synchronized their cover stories relative to these issues as MSKCC has done in the past relative to other white-washes for which Sloan “conducted its own investigation” (eg: EH&S, “drug dealing” in its basement [the General Stores (GS) takes up a large portion of the MSKCC basement and one must be concerned as to if and how extensively the GS were compromised [and if government subsidized products or patient safety were compromised])? Is MSKCC following the Hippocratic or Hypocritic Oath? The PI of the lab discussed in this note has in the past been ‘predicted’ to win the Nobel Prize,
see: http://scientific.thomson.com/press/2007/8407285/
People and Institutes capable of performing this level of science clearly know better than to act this way, especially when it is clearly not necessary. One is reminded of the “don’t you care,” and “Ending” scenes from Al Pacino’s And Justice For All. MSKCC, we hoped that you would be our hero. Minimally, you're SUPPOSED to care. MSKCC's slogan is "the best cancer care anywhere"; apparently per the CFO, not if you have a serious or advanced cancer and given the interesting self serving leverage that non clinicians attempt to invoke only if consistent with their stock portfolio's health. MSKCC: Shame on you! How dare you!
Would you repeat that?
http://www.clinicaltrialsblog.org/wordpress
Laboratory for Bioorganic Chemistry
Sloan Kettering Institute for Cancer Research
Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
To: NIOSH, NY OSHA (Compliance Control Officer), NYFD Deputy Chief Inspector (Lab Unit),
EPA (CEPP)
From: C-14 (Chemistry Laboratory) Certificate of Fitness Holder, Sloan-Kettering Institute
To whom it may concern,
I am a C-14 (Chemistry Laboratory) Certificate of Fitness Holder at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center's, Sloan-Kettering Institute-Rockefeller Research Laboratory (RRL) Building (430 E. 67th Street). In light of a recently announced fine to Sloan-Kettering by the EPA (apparently relative to mislabeled medical waste) and alleged 'threats' to 'individuals or civic leader(s)' (local 'Our Town' Newspaper, relative to Sloan's contentious laboratory building initiative), I feel it appropriate to call your attention to (and submit for the record a report of) intermittent, yet recurrent chronic, un-rectified systemic infrastructure shortcomings at the (RRL) Building that stand to affect (and are likely affecting) the environmental health and safety (EH&S) of myself, my co-workers and by extrapolation, the surrounding Community. I do this for my own protection and for the protection of my former, current and future colleagues and colleague-charges. Rectification of these safety issues may warrant your organization's investigation (e.g.: re air quality analysis, fire safety, and architectural records relative to known ductwork [and other infrastructure] problems) and/or oversight as these conditions continue to re-manifest themselves, intermittently, to date. Prior to the composition (and submission) of this note, I have contacted the proposed recipients' [office(s) and/or organization(s)] and have received counsel as to where to submit my query. The goal of this query is to facilitate a mechanism whereby chronic problems that I've witnessed, or that have been reported to me by circumspect colleagues, in RRL over a ten-year period are addressed in a satisfactory (as opposed to a superficial and/or stopgap) manner and solved.
I have worked at MSKCC for approximately ~12+ years and have not missed one day of work (that has not been made up in a timely manner). Since 1993 I have worked on RRL 13. I have either witnessed (or received reports from circumspect colleagues of) systemic shortcomings in the Facilities Management and the infrastructure of the RRL building that have allowed for Sloan's employees (and by extrapolation, the surrounding Community) to be exposed to acutely dangerous as well as to chronically negligent environmental health and safety conditions. Below, I outline but a few examples and briefly summarize the intransigence, hostility of (and misstatement of facts by) MSKCC's Facilities Management Administration, the Safety Department and their confederates when they are asked to investigate and / or address these environmental health and safety issues.
Symptoms of systemic problems are manifested in the form of and include, but are not limited to:
*Cross contamination and/or recirculation of supposedly evacuated substances via faulty ductwork (that was never installed properly), drains, improperly sealed floors/ceilings/(and unused [covered (e.g.: by installed walls), yet not sealed] drains) and elevator shafts [(a) between rooms on RRL 13, (b) between RRL 13 and the animal facility on RRL 12, and (c) between RRL 13 and other RRL floors] occurs intermittently, yet is unabated and is consistent with exposure of workers to fungus, mold, animal secretion exudates and organic and volatile, toxic (and otherwise harmful) compounds, chemicals, solvents, biohazards, radioactive-substances, carcinogens and disease causing microorganisms and/or pathogens.
*The animal facility cross-contamination and/or 'seepage' also occurs on other floors in RRL and is intermittently prevalent in the lavatories.
*Reports of cross contamination between supposedly mutually exclusive chemical fume hoods by extremely circumspect, high caliber Ph.D. researchers has in the past been dismissed by MSKCC Facilities Management Administrators as 'impossible.' Germane to this issue is that there is a 'radiation room' on the floor that apparently utilizes fume hoods.
*Water leaks intermittently from the ceiling, from ducts and/or (distilled?) water conduits in RRL 1326, the NMR Core Facility, a room with organic and volatile solvents and cascades over, through (and at times remains settled stagnantly in) live fluorescent light fixtures. This 'phenomena' also occurs at other locations on RRL13. Initial reports of this phenomena resulted in Sloan-Facilities workers stating that we'd have to 'wait a few weeks' to address the problem, which continues, intermittently, to date.
*Although I have not missed one day of work in ~12+ years at Sloan I have experienced bouts of severe, chronic bronchitis, whose incidence(s) correlate positively with the HVAC/safety problems discussed in this note. If one can smell the airborne exudates(s) from the animal facility/cages (e.g.: putrid wood-shaving beds, urine, feces, etc.) one is also smelling and being exposed to and absorbing any airborne biohazards, toxins, carcinogens, teratogens, pathogens [including airborne dander from experimental animals treated with experimental, often toxic substances] etc., concomitant and associated with the animal facility environment. [Having worked with (nude) mice as but one component of a post-baccalaureate research laboratory technician position with a lab focused on monoclonal antibodies at another Research Institute I am not completely naive relative to the environmental, health and safety concerns and limitations affiliated with a research animal facility].
*Other health related concerns/events that correlate positively with RRL infrastructure (HVAC?) shortcomings include the fact that an otherwise healthy postdoctoral had once collapsed on the floor, requiring plastic surgery to address his resultant injury. Another researcher on the floor had been diagnosed with pneumonia. Earlier, 4 coworkers missed as much as one week each, while suffering from severe respiratory infections. In addition, another Investigator suffers from ear, nose and throat complications that intermittently require medical attention. This researcher's office has intermittent, yet unabated, air circulation problems. If not (minimally, partially) causative, the air circulation problems on the floor can only exacerbate this Investigator's ENT problem.
*Growth-media (supposedly unused on RRL 13) and therefore microbes growing in it that may become airborne, whose source is unknown but may include biohazard hood systems elsewhere in the building (but apparently not on RRL 13), and whose conduit source may include drains, ducts and elevator shafts, is intermittently sensed (smelled) on RRL 13.
*The Sloan Building Services attendant assigned to RRL13, on more than one occasion, has apprised me of a film of unknown composition that regularly settle(s) atop the bookcases in RRL 1301, an administrative office with known ductwork problems.
*Chemicals (that smell like either pyridines (a known teratogen) and/or acid chlorides or chloroformates are intermittently smelled on RRL 13 (RRL 1301 [an administrative office] and RRL13's North and East Corridors) even though these chemicals are supposedly used on RRL 13 solely in the fume hoods, are stored in freezers in the RRL Central Core Lab, and one cannot smell the chemicals in the aisles of the laboratories when they are sensed (smelled) in the administrative office and/or corridor.
*In the past, when I reported chemical smells similar to those mentioned above in the hallways and offices on the floor, the head of MSKCC Safety invoked the tea kettle-pot, mutual-accusation conundrum. The fact that chemicals are used in supposedly functioning fume hoods and stored in freezers in the RRL Core and Labs, does not account for why chemicals are smelled in administrative offices and halls where there is apt (on any given day) to be little, or no, circulation.
The HVAC problems have re-manifested in the form of ductwork that was intermittently down for extended periods of time in RRL 1301, as well as in the South East quadrant of RRL 13, where it once it caused clear overheating and apparent burning. The latter was reported to MSKCC Facilities Management and Lab Operations. The following day, it was reported to me by another COF (Certificate of Fitness) holder on RRL that the NYFD (fire department) responded to an alarm in RRL and that RRL 13 employees were warned over the intercom to "prepare to evacuate."
At one point the Rockefeller Research Laboratory needed to be evacuated following a chemical spill on RRL 14 and perfusion of an irritant (that was initially described as 'chlorine' or 'bromine' by the circumspect, high caliber Ph.D. chemists on the floor who were wary of and alarmed by the irritant because 'no one in the lab' was 'working with chlorine or bromine' at the time [at that point in time there was also a concern on the floor relative to cross-contamination between supposedly mutually exclusive fume hoods, of which the 'chlorine' was possibly another example of cross-contamination]) on to the 13th floor. MSKCC, in a Memo distributed to all employees via email from the head of Safety (but possibly co-written, edited, approved, ghosted or issued via edict by an administrator, administrators or the Public Affairs office) neither of whom, unlike myself, was (or were) on site when this situation developed, dismissed the event. Sloan would have you believe that gas wafted through two closed doors in the emergency stairwell and through a third (a southern) laboratory door, jumped over open space in the south end of a lab (where it could not be smelled or otherwise sensed) and settled mid room in front of and below multiple, segregated and isolated hoods, ducts and drains. Sloan subsequently dismissed as 'impossible' the likelihood that the chlorine-like irritant perfused through the air ducts, drains and fume hoods even though Sloan admitted once again soon after the incident (via posted announcement that duct work controls would be replaced throughout the building) that the duct work in the building did not work properly. [Previously, it had been reported to me on more than one occasion (e.g.: from a contractor who worked on the RRL 13 retrofit and an MSKCC Safety Officer) that the ductwork had unbelievably, but assuredly, knowingly not been installed properly by MSKCC. At that point in time although Sloan knew of this situation, MSKCC had not rectified the problem.] Following the evacuation a senior administrator from MSKCC Facilities (its Director) attempted to intimidate me ("warning" me that I "upset a lot of people") when I challenged the veracity of the MSKCC inaccurate assuagement. [Accurate reportage at that point in time could have drawn unwanted attention to RRL's HVAC problems and the then known fact that the ductwork was not installed (and/or functioning) properly]. Though others may experience post-intimidation amnesia, I feel that unit integrity also equates with unit safety.
Subsequently, a smoke condition (secondary to a car fire in the RRL basement-garage) developed and rapidly increased in intensity on RRL13. The fire and the resultant smoke condition resulted in the evacuation of RRL. At no point in time did smoke alarms sound on RRL13. In variance with past requests, fire alarms are still not located in laboratories on RRL 13, rooms where the majority of workers on RRL 13 carry out their assigned duties. The fire alarms that are located on the floor are (mostly) inaudible in the laboratory rooms. In deference to MSKCC Lab-Ops and Safety, after this event and in variance with past (previously discussed) safety incidents, Lab-Ops asked for a 'no holds barred' report of the incident from our (RRL13 Fire Wardens') perspective and we have provided such a report to Sloan-Lab-Ops (that may be pooled, weighed and compared with other reports [from local perspectives] of the incident).
The combination of faulty ductwork, improperly sealed and porous floors (that render moot and impeaches the credibility of supposedly functioning HVAC/duct systems), ceilings, and drainage systems is a particularly pernicious cocktail considering silica, radioactive substances, cyanide, pyridines, nitrogen and many other toxins, poisons and carcinogens are used on RRL 13 and that innumerable pathogens, biohazards and other disease facilitating microbes are present in the animal facility below (and/or throughout the RRL building). The material safety data sheets for silica, nitrogen and pyridine reveal but three justifications for concern [e.g.: A few years ago a worker apparently died of asphyxiation due to nitrogen gas exposure (secondary to a liquid nitrogen bleed) in a nearby medical facility that housed an MRI magnet enclosed in a room with limited air circulation, not unlike the NMR magnet (which is cooled via liquid nitrogen in a manner similar to an MRI) in the RRL 13 Core Facility, that is on a floor with known ductwork and air circulation problems]. The MSK Facilities Management Department or those instructing them, operating in conjunction with them, or under its aegis has a history of doing (or overseeing) poor/negligent work, allowing for (and indifference to) exposure of Sloan's employees to dangerous conditions, of not being on top of the infrastructure of the current RRL (research) building, of conjuring and synchronizing cover stories following safety incidents, of attempting to bully, threaten and/or attempt to intimidate employees so that they do not accurately report safety incidents or problems, of refusing to investigate (and denial when confronted with) these problems in an attempt to cover-up and avoid accurate reporting of environmental-health related problems and shortcomings that
MSK-Facilities is responsible for causing) - thereby neglecting, jeopardizing and disregarding Employee (and Community) Safety [e.g.: a NYC Public School is located immediately adjacent to RRL and a private Pre-School has been located in the adjacent building, in the space formerly occupied by the MSKCC Library's basement]. I have listed but a few examples. Your organization(s) may consider that aspects related to the interface between Sloan/RRL infrastructure and Worker' and Community Health may warrant investigation, monitoring and/or rectification, if appropriate — especially considering that the Sloan-Facilities-Management Team is currently entrusted with oversight of the construction of an otherwise eminently warranted, imminently necessary and appropriate new research tower, on a nearby residential block (whose construction required a variance in NYC zoning laws following contentious debate within the rightfully concerned and apprehensive, adjacent Community).
Though one might expect Sloan to dismiss the allegations presented in this note as statistically insignificant, coincidental, untrue, or venial (e.g.: by dismissing systemic, chronic EH&S problems as merely an occasionally malfunctioning thermostat), the EH&S concerns are accurate. I know that I am not the only person who has posited reports relative to EH&S and/or air circulation problems on RRL 13 with MSKCC Facilities, Safety or Lab-Ops. I don't think the Facilities Management team would have the temerity to act as cavalierly as they have relative to EH&S issues without tacit/implicit approval or explicit instructions from (past or present) senior administrators at Sloan [some of whom may have at one point in time been naive to, have been kept in the dark (possibly, so as to be able to seek indemnity or invoke plausible deniability as to culpability, or merely due to deception at the Facilities' end of the operation) and/or inherited the EH&S problems from (a) prior administration(s)].
Although a catastrophic accident at RRL is feasible, I intuit what is more likely to occur are unnecessary health complications to Sloan-Employees concomitant with long-term chronic exposure to hazards that would not have occurred if the safety problems mentioned in this note were (or are) addressed in a timely manner by Sloan. During my tenure on RRL 13 I have witnessed a situation where MSKCC Facilities, while attempting to cover up these issues is dictating (rather than following sound) safety policy. In variance with the above, I do know that Sloan is capable of sporting a respectable veneer (and of dotting their 'i's' and crossing their 't's') when inspected re health and safety issues by outside agencies (e.g.: EPA, NYFD).
Based partially on talk amongst employees, it would not surprise me if Sloan is dealing with these and/or other known systemic environmental, health and safety infrastructure shortcomings in RRL via clandestine, unannounced plans to treat the new research tower being constructed as a 'replacement' building (for RRL), rather than for its stated purposes of decompression and expansion (and replacement of other (much older) MSKCC laboratories, such as the Kettering Laboratory). If this hypothesis were true, Sloan could purge RRL of all of its researchers and move them into the new building thereby granting Sloan the opportunity to gut RRL, [and some have stated that RRL may be] convert(ed it) into coincidentally lucrative outpatient facilities, while at the same time coincidentally destroying evidence of unnecessary chronic exposure of its unknowing, innocent and naive employees (and by extrapolation the rightfully suspicious and wary, yet naive surrounding Community) to health hazards.
A noxious 'forever loop' wherein RRL exhaust is somehow re-circulated through an intake vent (possibly as the result of poor design and/or oversight during the RRL 13 retrofit that neglected to account for pre-existing exhaust and / or intake vents) may be a contributing factor to these problems. Following the 'chlorine' incident and building evacuation in 2000, it was reported to me by circumspect colleagues that the MSKCC Facilities Management team considered such a 'forever loop' (of [at that point in time] unknown origin) to be a possible contributing factor in that incident, prior to MSKCC-Facilities' dismissal of a 'forever-loop' factor in that incident, and otherwise attempting to sweep what actually did occur under the rug.
I have also heard that RRL 13 is not the only floor where workers have experienced severe bronchial problems. It would not surprise me if Sloan (if and when bullying and / or intimidation prove unsuccessful) attempts to purchase the silence of those who experience breathing problems that are positively correlated with RRL HVAC problems, assuaging an individual, but not addressing the problem's cause or solving the underlying problem(s). As stated elsewhere in this note, I know first hand that Sloan attempts to win through intimidation silence relative to accurate reporting of safety related problems.
Stagnant water (such as that which accumulates secondary to the ceiling-leak-'phenomena'), combined with ductwork problems and an endless source of exposure to microorganisms may constitute a legionella or pneumonia (causative agent) hospitable environment and it may be appropriate to consider the installation of ultraviolet germicidal lights in the ductwork systems, similar to those apparently studied in The Lancet, (2003, 362 (9898), 1785), if such systems are not already in use and are not in variance with intermittent contact with volatile chemicals that may coincidentally 'seep' into the ductwork.
My parents' first child died of complications from childhood leukemia at Memorial Hospital two years before I was born. A child with this affliction today stands a good chance of survival due in no small part to the therapeutic advances fomented at Sloan and other like-minded Institutions. Sloan's mission is nonpareil and I realize the need to be circumspect, especially in these post-9/11 'trying times' when the scope of Sloan's high caliber mission is magnified (and your organizations rightfully need to be focused on external safely threats) — all the more reason that the health and safety of Sloan's (mostly) selfless employees (and the surrounding Community) not be held hostage by Sloan's Facilities Management team. No one, myself included, wants any lab downtime. However, Sloan should not be absolved from addressing EH&S matters such as those discussed in this note (which although intermittent are unabated) in a timely manner.
Although I am a 'Certificate-of-Fitness-Holder', the Administrative Manager (AM) on RRL 13 has in the past counseled me to not report safety issues (to let another 'professional' address Safety matters). Although she is a full-time employee, the AM is regularly on the Sloan campus only ~ 50% time and focuses on patent accruals (and other curious, [oft personal] finance-related matters) and is therefore exposed to any health hazards secondary to any RRL infrastructure and safety shortcomings but a fraction of the time of true full-time employees who are on the SKI campus 100% time (or more). The AM's ([oft personal] financially guided) focus may constitute a conflict of interest with (and be in variance with) any necessary and / or appropriate rectification of safety problems that may (unfortunately, but possibly, necessarily, temporarily, or partially) interrupt the laboratory's workflow.
I hope these thoughts are of interest to you and germane to your organization's purview. I may be reached via the numbers listed below should your organization(s) seek clarification or wish me to elaborate further on these matters. If requested, I can point out exactly where the incidents and / or conditions reported and discussed in this note have (and continue intermittently to) occur(ed). As mentioned above, I feel it appropriate to posit these safety concerns in light of my responsibility to (and also so as to protect myself as well as) past, present and future colleagues and charges, especially considering [for what it's worth] the collective symbolic and physical investment in this Institution by my family [its blood (my brother's), sweat (mine) and tears (my parents')]. In the limit, your organization(s) will have on file an official lodging of these concerns relative to infrastructure shortcomings relative to environmental, health and safety issues at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center/SKI in RRL so that when they recur and resurface Sloan will not be able to duck and/or deny their existence or plead naiveté.
Should you investigate these EH&S issues I do request that my name not be provided to Sloan (that I retain anonymity), so as to protect myself (in light of past attempts by Sloan to threaten / intimidate workers) and thank you, in advance, for considering investigation of these concerns.
In sum, I am not saying that an imminently catastrophic situation exists at Sloan-RRL [although it would not surprise me if one were to occur] or that on any given day that all (or any) of the above-mentioned environmental health and safety related events and/or conditions occur. I am stating that in a building strewn with innumerable toxins, carcinogens, poisons, pathogens, disease facilitating microbes, radioactive substances and biohazards such as RRL (whose windows cannot be opened) that proper ventilation has not been provided, that systemically (and quite often) safety features have not worked properly and / or are rendered moot by other (correctable, yet uncorrected) means of cross contamination, seepage and/or possible re-circulation of chemicals (possibly or supposedly) previously evacuated or exhausted and that notwithstanding requests to rectify these problems, that they continue (albeit intermittently) un-checked to date. Stopgap or patchwork fixes have just not solved the problem(s) which are likely systemic in nature rather than curious anomalies that just happen to appear. The cumulative result is that the RRL building is intermittently and unnecessarily rendered a toxic firetrap and has been and continues to be an unnecessary source of chronic exposure of Sloan's employees to dangerous substances. A seasonal ritual seems to have developed on RRL 13 wherein an MSKCC-Plant-Ops (Facilities) worker responds to verbal reports of dead air or temperature (heating/cooling) issues, is 'surprised' to discover the extent of RRL ductwork (-to-nowhere?-) problems and returns to RRL 13 tittering and smirking (and then attempts to humor those reporting the problems) - yet the problems discussed continue albeit intermittently: Water leaks through live light fixtures, animal facility cross contamination [the animal facility has since apparently been moved off campus] chemical smell(s) in hallways and administrative offices that have known ductwork and circulation problems, chemical smell(s) in the hallway / cross-contamination phenomena. Real, serious and chronic systemic infrastructure shortcomings that stand to affect (and are likely affecting) the health and safety of my coworkers and of myself have existed and continue to exist. These may warrant, minimally, investigation (e.g.: re air quality analysis, analysis of MSKCC employee health records relative to breathing problems in RRL, fire safety, architectural record investigation [though given that I've witnessed Sloan-Facilities misstating the facts and attempting to strong-arm the suppression of accurate reportage by first responders to past safety incidents, it would not surprise me if the credibility of Sloan's -architectural records is also impeached]) and possibly outside oversight and / or monitoring, especially given the predicted, severe flu seasons [e.g.: On RRL13, a floor that has known ductwork/air circulation problems, minimally 7 people on RRL13 have recently experienced maladies whose symptoms include severe upper respiratory and/or sinus infections and / or a high fever] and the trust the justifiably concerned surrounding Community places in Sloan via its Facility Management Team's oversight of the construction of the new research tower.
As stated in the introductory paragraph of this query, I have spoken with the offices of (most of) the proposed recipients of this note prior to its composition and submission (and received counsel as to where to submit the query). If the concerns addressed in this note do not fall under the aegis of your office, but do fall under the aegis of your organization, I'm hopeful that you'll forward these concerns to the appropriate desk/department. If these concerns do not fall under the aegis of your organization, I apologize in advance for forwarding this to your office. Since these matters continue, intermittently, to date, if you have counsel as to where to legitimately pursue these concerns elsewhere (in a non-inflammatory way, whose end-goal is the investigation and rectification of the Safety problems [i.e. To provide insight towards the correction of these concerns, rather than to incite]) other than to those organizations and/or individuals on the enclosed recipient list, I would also appreciate your input.
I would not submit this note relative to EH&S concerns at RRL/Sloan if these issues had been addressed and solved in a timely and satisfactory manner and not covered up by Sloan-Facilities, and if a high threshold and tolerance level on my part had not been eclipsed many times over by Sloan-Facilities' shortcomings and attempts at intimidation during my 10+ years, while stationed on RRL 13. My intuition is that if these issues fall under the aegis of your organization(s) and if you investigate these concerns, that you will find extant, systemic safety problems and/or infractions and a trail of attempted deception relative to reporting of safety shortcomings in RRL in the past. I also intuit that those culpable will firstly deny the existence of any safety problems, and that if/and/when confronted with evidence of their existence those culpable will attempt to diminish its intensity, claim naiveté, plead indemnity and eventually claim that they were 'only following' instructions. Yet, while Sloan-Facilities was ducking and dodging (and tittering and smirking relative to) Safety shortcomings in RRL in the past, its employees (and its surrounding Community) have unnecessarily been exposed to hazards secondary to them. I have often felt that Sloan expects its workers to do them a favor (or to use a 1960's term used on the television show 'the Mod Squad', to 'solid' them) by accepting these EH&S problems as merely an occupational hazard, since Sloan through its inaction clearly considers the systemic EH&S issues as no-big-deal (or 'no-biggie'), resulting in their non-rectification. But while the Sloan-Facilities Team might expect Sloan's workers to continue 'soliding' them for what they consider to be 'no biggies' the Facilities team continues to titter, smirk and otherwise sweep these problems under the rug. I have problems with that arrangement wherein Sloan's employees are expected to continue 'soliding' Sloan, while Sloan is unnecessarily gassing, wafting, neglecting, and otherwise (possibly) poisoning its employees (and by extrapolation, the surrounding Community) especially when my coworkers, my colleague-charges and myself are on the short end of that arrangement, while Sloan's EH&S neglect and detritus is apt to wind up in my (and our) lungs.
Following a prompt from the MSKCC President to lobby NYC zoning/building officials (as MSKCC employees saw fit) relative to a contentious building initiative, I submitted a letter containing some of the concerns discussed in this note to some of the zoning/building commission members (and at that point in time requested that, that note not be circulated). However, to date, I have not submitted anything in writing to agencies that may have EH&S oversight. In addition, I have edited this note extensively, and have sent iterations via email to and from my personal email account. Accordingly, I would not be surprised if Sloan may have monitored my email account and is privy to the contents of this note and has accordingly updated the synchronization of their EH&S related cover stories.
The admittedly critical tone of this note is proportional to the cumulative indifference, sloppiness, arrogance and attempts to suppress by intimidation legitimate reports of Safety shortcomings at MSKCC in RRL (whose end-goal is the rectification of such problems), with which Sloan and (members and administrators of) its Facilities Management team have conducted themselves relative to EH&S issues in RRL in the past. Accordingly, I submit this note without reservation in the hope that Sloan (and its Facilities team) might account for and rectify these safety concerns and issues. We live in a post-9/11/01 New York, USA, not a pre-12/84 Bhopal, India. It is not inappropriate to expect that problems relative to Environmental Health and Safety (read: the toxic fire trap that RRL [specifically RRL 13] has unnecessarily been in the past and continues to unnecessarily intermittently be), be addressed properly and solved in a timely manner. Though one would not expect Sloan to self-flagellate, one shouldn't expect Sloan to exercise a double standard as they have (expecting complete candor from those who work in an academic environment, while not being candid relative to EH&S matters themselves). Sloan (via its Facilities Management team and their confederates) has been less than honest and less than forthright relative to such EH&S issues in the past.
I thank you, in advance, for considering the matters discussed in this note.
Sincerely yours,
[C-14 (Chemistry Laboratory) Certificate of Fitness Holder,
SKI/RRL Fire-Warden (RRL-13)]
Sloan-Kettering Institute for Cancer Research
Wow. Just, I don't know what to say.
!Famous wished for do-overs in the annals of Chemistry!
1. Linus Pauling wishing he’d studied Rosalind Franklin’s Xray Crystallography Pictures closely!
2. Bill Bornmann wishing his MSKCC process staff ordered the correct Wieland–Miescher ketone (or a mirror!;) before supplying mass quantities of previously solved puzzle pieces to Danishefsky’s Taxol discovery team when first and goal!
3. Dr. Sarah (cravenly self serving & no-show-job) Danishefsky telling a selfless Editorial and Graphics Specialist who was running a paper chase and working countless hours for the Awesome Professor Samuel Danishefsky during an annual appraisal that a raise of a few thousand dollars was unobtainable and then telling him to get a night job while admiring her own 403B retirement statement and complaining about her inability to ‘check my stocks’!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Y4hiHgHcNU&feature=related
end scene!
I found out why she doesn’t have a motive.
You know why?
Because she’s not lying.
It’s a show, it’s just a show!
You’re supposed to stand for something.
You’re supposed to protect people.
YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO CARE
Re:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIuq9Vpp3aA
!4:30 -> 7:10!
Don’t you care? Don’t you even care?
Damn right I care, but not about them.
They’re people, they’re just people
Remember MSKCC and Drs. Danishefsky:
People afflicted with cancer are people, they’re just people
And Justice For All … MSKCC/Drs. Danishefsky. … God knows all ... and one day you will see that and the intermittently palpable disingenuousness that wrongly and unnecessarily emanates from MSKCC will be plain.
Danishefsky disingenuous moment revelation of the day: Prof. Danishefsky is wont to nominate himself (via proxy) for scientific accolades by providing a prepared 'nomination package' to a proposed 'nominator' or 'seconder' (e.g. Profs. Eschenmoser, Schreiber, Stork). Perhaps the next time one is asked to proxy an autonomination the proposed nominator/seconder should ask Professor Danishefsky is his (and Dr. Sarah Danishefsky's) moral compass is 'on'. It must exist, considering all of the religious study undertaken.
MSKCC Facilities relevant deceitful moment revelation of the day: MSKCC Facilities' Director declares as 'you upset a lot of people' when a C14 Laboratory Certificate of Fitness Holder corrected the egregious misstatements of facts by MSKCC following an emergent and necessary building evacuation. MSKCC Facilities had built a laboratory filled with chemicals and found no need to install ductwork controls http://www.osha.gov/pls/imis/establishment.inspection_detail?id=307012641
... this is just the tip of the iceberg
re: The Elie Wiesel Prize in Ethics; essay title: “The Weasels of Sloan Kettering”
The Elie Wiesel Prize in Ethics
The Elie Wiesel Foundation For Humanity
555 Madison Avenue, 20th Floor
New York, NY 10022
http://www.eliewieselfoundation.org
December 2010
re: The Elie Wiesel Prize in Ethics; essay title: “The Weasels of Sloan Kettering”
“Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer]; The mission of Sloan Kettering / MSKCC is nonpareil. There are instances of brilliance, selflessness, as well as egregiously unnecessary and inappropriate craven self servitude, shameless self promotion, a completely unnecessary and inappropriate intermittently palpable disingenuousness (whose transgressors ought to be ashamed of themselves considering that they clearly know better), conflicted interests, invocation of the follow the money syndrome, a bizarre confluence of facilities management shortcomings (see OSHA, EPA) that could impeach the credibility of reaction conditions and thus scientific results, curious navigation of the who works for whom (Public Affairs or Facilities for SKI/MSKCC, or its converse) conundrum), a ruse invoked to promote a much needed and ballyhooed replacement research building, thinly veiled attempts to sweep the above (and other curious anomalies) under the rug (by puppets from the Research Resources Management and/or MSK Facilities Management divisions) as well as people who (though they know better) by their actions would steal hope in variance with MSKCC's mission of steeling hope. Why would a non-clinician attempt to influence enrollment in a clinical trial of a competitor by embargoing information relative to its availability to oft desperate cancer patients (or their proxies)? Why would a non-clinician attempt to leverage a clinician to continue enrollment in a clinical trial in variance with the clinician’s better judgment (might very large milestone royalty payments influence this tack)? Why would MSKCC Facilities build a laboratory building and knowingly not install ductwork controls, install faulty fume evacuation hoods and possibly purified water conduits that can compromise reaction conditions and concomitantly patient safety? Why would an employee 'deal' prescription drugs in MSKCC's basement (its General Stores takes up a large part of the basement, so one must consider how much of the General Stores were compromised and if patients safety was jeopardized); Why would an employee graft over 1 million $ in toner cartridge? For invocation of the Danishefsky Deception [they are green (haute connoisseurs of mucophagy and rhinotillexamania), but at times do not access a moral compass and exhibit some of the most disingenuous behavior witnessed by the author of this essay], we recommend the establishment of the Danishefsky Chair in Bioethics, a toilet seat emblazoned in gold lettering with the citation 'you're supposed to care'. In recognition of MSKCC's bizarre infrastructure shortcomings, we recommend that henceforth its Facilities Management team (Ed Mahoney is its incumbent VP) wear Clown Costumes as a standard issue uniform. MSKCC, we hoped you’d be our hero; MSKCC, minimally, you’re supposed to care. Shame on you MSKCC, you know better. MSKCC, you ought to provide leadership by example, don’t be a weasel. Hopefully, with Professor Thompson's fledgling tenure as MSKCC's President will come nulling of its conjuring, synchronizing and squirming invocation of cover stories and adherence to its moral compass(es). Please see http://www.mskccethicsandsafetyconcerns.wordpress.com and/or http://www.concerns-at-sloankettering.blogspot.com for a summary of these and related concerns.
[This message is relative to ethics and safety concerns at a high profile cancer center (MSKCC), where clinical trial candidates are developed. It is not provided by MSKCC. It does not imply that one should not seek appropriate medical attention for an ailment by a reputable physician (at MSKCC or elsewhere)].
Feedback received to date (paraphrased): 'we already knew that'
Forwarded worldwide to academics, editors, news organizations
DanishefskyLeak of the day: Substance abusing graduate student Silas Cook (with a 'spotting' accomplice) throw a heavy object (a watermelon!) off of the Columbia University Chemistry Building during a welcoming barbecue for new students onto a patio strewn with faculty, staff, students and even children. Faculty lobby, up through Deans Office, for immediate dismissal of SC, but Danishefsky successfully lobbies for ‘promising’ graduate student who eventually assumes professorship at Indiana [wants me, Lord I can’t go back there …]. Did you get your load on today?
COI [Conflicts of Interest]: So, let’s get this straight … The Danishefskys apply for and receive a relatively new (at that point) NIH RAID (Rapid Application for Industrial Development) Grant to bridge the gap between promising new discoveries and potential industrial (Big Pharma / Biotech) luring courtships. Ed Sausville of NIH oversees the vetting of the MSKCC/Bioorganic candidate drug (epothilones and derivatives). Competitive epothiline candidate(s) [e.g. from Novartis and BMS] are out of the proverbial clinical trials starting gate … even being conducted at Sloan [MSKCC]. The Danishefskys having had to drop out of a much publicized natural product synthesis race for what has turned out to be a(n almost!) billion dollar molecule (!Taxol!) following a major faux pas by an in house process lab [oops!, wrong WMK dooming an otherwise inevitably successful first synthesis when the discovery team was first and goal] to failure … have their guard up! … and when an article appears in the lay press (The WSJ!!) and desperate cancer stricken patients or their proxies intrepidly contact the Bioorganic Lab assuming the Bioorganic derivative has made it into Sloan’s clinical trials … instructs a coworker to embargo information relative to epothilone clinical trial availability … Sarah Danishefsky … THAT’s NOT NICE. SHAME ON YOU … BOO. You know better. We know that because of all of that religiosity you portend. It gets better … According to Bill Bornmann (whose in house process shop seems not to know its right from its left [literally] … ) Professor Danishefsky subsequently irritates David Spriggs, head of clinical trials at Sloan … by aggressively lobbying to continue enrollment in Bioorganic’s epothilone clinical trial candidate against Sprigg’s better judgment … alas, at that point, LARGE milestone dependent ROYALTY PAYMENTS lay in the balance [e.g. if you finish a clinical ‘phase’ then big \(, if not no \)] … Samuel Danishefsky, THAT’s NOT NICE. BOO. MSKCC, need some pawns or dupes? You know better! … and it gets better. Guess where Ed Sausville winds up? On the SAB (Scientific Advisory Board) of the very Biotech Company [Kosan] that purchased the licensing rights to MSKCC/Bioorganic’s epothilone derivative (prior to burying the hatchet with BMS).
Just remember, MSKCC, The BEST Cancer Care anywhere … as long as it is consistent with the potential profits of MSKCC …
“Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer].
Oh, and don’t forget to conjure and synchronize your cover stories …
... and we didn't even touch on any of the bizarre infrastructure environmental health and safety 'concerns' at Sloan ... wonder if they've had to abandon a building or have a lab construction 'do over' lately?
typo/gui misprint correction of above ...
...LARGE milestone dependent ROYALTY PAYMENTS lay in the balance [e.g. if you finish a clinical ‘phase’ then big , money if not no money] …
more MSKCC/Danishefsky-leaks de jour:
According to Sarah Freih* MSKCC's Director of Communications (and intermittent spokesperson) [Christine Hickey] has had a substance abuse issue in her family, apparently cocaine abuse. Somehow, it seems dark humorously appropriate that MSKCC's Propaganda Department's Communications Czar is somehow affiliated with mind altering drugs [if what Ms. Sarah Freih* says is true]. That's understandable considering how Sloan throws under buses selfless employees (dismissal on pretext, e.g. when reporting safety concerns that result ultimately in MSKCC ABANDONING a whole building??) ...
There's a 'named lecture', the Jack Fox Lecture at MSKCC! One year, unfortunately Mrs. Jack Fox passed on and Dr. Fox brought his daughter with him to the named lecture. Dr. Sarah Danishefsky, having already conjured a seating plan for the post lecture dinner ... did not want to seat Dr. Jack Fox's daughter as it was in variance with her social plans. How lovely. How in variance with such a classy group of people. Boo.
Another Jack Fox Lecture tale of woe. Peter Dervan, as in THE Peter Dervan [the one who was bested by David Baltimore relative to CalTech's Presidency ... (paraphrasing the great Sam Danishefsky ... 'that was Peter's position ...' [or apparently, at least the one Dervan thought was his, yes??] ...), so Peter Dervan was having some twubble duplicating experimental results for one of his mainstay raison d'etre thing(ies) ... and dear ol' Peter wanted to milquetoast out and cancel his lecture ... but got a pep talk from Sam ... and indeed Sarah the lovely ... and gave the talk!
Lastly, for today, invoking the way-back machine, a new colleague interacts with the Awesome Samuel J. Danishefsky after having met with Bill Bornmann the forever postdoc hired to squire SJD through his transition ... new colleague (paraphrased) states that he assumed all were 'world class chemists' (inclusive of Bill Bornmann), to which SJD replies: 'Bill's a BIRD-BRAIN' ... oh well.
MSKCCheats/DanishefskyDeception Leak of the Day: Hello Dali! ... Dali, the Great [Dalibor Sames, aka Dr. Retraction, Dr. Don't F*ck Your Students, Dr. Teflon]: ... E/G Spec: is Dali as good as people say he is? [redacted] PostDocLab Manager: Yep! ... I don't know what all the fuss is about Dali. He has bad teeth and he smells. (unnamed postdoc, who hatched and went to Pfizer). [Editor's note: It is reported that Dali has since discovered soap and now showers regularly].
MSKCCheats/DanishefskyDeception Leak de L'Heure: So Professor Danishefsky is wont to nominate himself (via proxy!) for various scientific accolades (including the BIG one ... having penned in long hand the first page of that nomination ON a copy of the nomination form in variance with its clear statement that one may not nominate themself!!) ... one award that he coveted is what he [Sam, the Man] referred to as THE BMS (Bristol Myers Squibb) Award. A few unscucessful forays in that initiative (autonominations submitted via proxy) left him pining for that ring tres mucho mucho. One day a colleague of his noted a full page spread on the back of a section of the NYTimes that John Mendelssohn (erstwhile head, dept. of Medicine, MSKCC ... subsequent absconsion to MD Anderson [as its President] when he wasn't chosen as its [MSKCC's] ... Paging Dr. Varmus! ... President) .. that John Mendelssohn won A BMS Award (grant??) ... naive to the difference between 'A' BMS Award and 'THE' BMS Award, the colleague reported to the Awesome Professor Danishefsky (aka Snow Globe) ... that John WON THE BMS Award! ... to which Sammy Baby responds by throwing down his pencil and declaring, (paraphrased): "... well, if HE won it, then I don't want it ..." which was fine with the Great Professor Danishefsky's colleague because the Great Professor Danishefsky arranged his own nomination for THAT Award anyway and his colleague could then concentrate on important paper chase [as opposed to autonomination] matters. Nonetheless, Sammy Baby Snow Globe was persistent and eventually whittled away at the BMS Jury ... and became an incumbent and subsequently an alum of that Award. Not sure if it was before or after BMS and Kosan stopped stabbing each other in the back over epothilone IP issues ... but if after, perhaps a thank you from BMS for not impeding progress ... in the IP realm. Epilogue: intermittently, MSKCC whose motto is 'the best cancer care anywhere' (of course, if consistent with the fiduciary betterment of Sloan ...), has been bested [intermittently] by John Mendelsshohn's shop (MD Anderson) in the Best Hospital Rankings. Wonder if Ms. Christine Hickey (of previously mentioned mind altering drug 'concerns') et al. from MSKCC's Propoganda Department edited their motto? QED.
MSKCCheats/TheDanishefskyDeception Leak d'Leure:
How often do you think Professor Danishefsky submitted his plane ticket multiple times for reimbursement either to MSKCC, Industry (Big Pharma/Biotech) Consultancies, or multiple times to different Consultant sites (on the same in seriatum trip), as either (paraphrased) 'my time is very important' or to cover Dr. Sarah Danishefsky's plane fare ... of course as Dr. Sarah Danishefsky oversees the reimbursement files, might one suspect that certain records are curiously not to be found? Might Professor Danishefsky and / or the lovely Dr. Sarah Danishefsky fall into the realm of ... 'liar, liar pants on fire'??
Stock tip of the Day: Professor Danishefsky was either a scientific founder or on the advisory board of Ariad. After Tech stocks flourished Biotech Stocks joined the fray ca. 1998/99. Ariad in variance with other Biotech Stocks was flatlining ca. $.50 (50 cents) as it was embroiled in a patent related he said - she said broohaha. Ca. October 1999 the matter was put to rest and akin to racing a car with the brake on, and then removing the brake, Ariad's stock launched to ~ $50.00 (fifty dollars, though actually slightly lower) or a 10,000% or 100x [one hundred times] increase until the biotech stock bubble burst ca. March 2000 following a joint news conference of Tony Blair and Bill Clinton espousing the sharing of genomic data (thereby possibly throwing a wrench into the plans those who sought to patent genes). Insiders may have been privy as to exactly when the Ariad IP issues would settle and may have passed on this information to others (e.g. friends, families, those whose favor(s) they sought or to hold sway [influence] over) ... and may have passed on 'insider stock information' ... How many such gifted Ariad millionaires do you think were generated via that hypothetical? John Deutch, erstwhile DCI (Director, Central Intelligence Agency [CIA]) under Clinton who was pardoned [he faux pas-ed by taking laptops with top secret information off campus (CIA campus, that is)] at midnight as Hillary was stealing the White House silverware by Clinton has had advisory (Director level?? or other) position(s) at Ariad. Wouldn't it be funny if Chelsea Clinton just happened to have purchased Ariad Stock (via proxy) at an interestingly, curious time frame? Were YOU an Ariad millionaire?
Now insiders of course are welcome to any profit they may accrue in a caveat emptor world ... but they need to remain Kosher (from an SEC perspective that is), yes?
... and the grand potential of profits earned has influenced the tack of non clinicians at Sloan attempting to influence enrollment in clinical trials. ... regardless of what the non clinicians say, regardless of how conjured and synchronized the cover stories of Sloan and its minions are.
Dr. Neal Rosen, Member [that's equivalent to tenure at a research institute for the naives out in the ether], MSKCC, once stated after being apprised of the Danishefsky's disingenuous / unethical tack stated that though what they did was reprehensible, it was not illegal. However, Sloan could lose its license to conduct clinical trials and that is why the incident(s) would need to be swept under the rug.
But, would YOU or a loved one want to be the pawn in such a situation, when desperate? SHAME on you MSKCC, SHAME on you Drs. Danishefsky YOU KNOW BETTER. ... especially considering all of the religiosity you portend.
Does Rabbi Potasnik (of the http://www.nybr.org) know how you have conducted yourselves?
Boo!
MSKCCheats/TheDanishefskyDeception Leak of the Day!:
Danishefsky Group is inevitably bested in a high profile natural product synthesis after the major faux pas of accepting without screening for chirality a L/R or d/l dooming reagent ... Holton and unbelievably KCN (the Great KC Nicolaou of Scripps, who for some unfathomable reason Nature held the presses for a paper whose ink was still wet after Hotlon's papers were reviewed, vetted and held up microscopically ...) 'win' the much ballyhooed and publicized !Taxol! race. John Masters, who wanted merely to be a chemistry teacher and who was convinced to get a Ph.D. with the caveat that he could always teach ... and who won a much coveted Damon Runyon Postdoctoral Fellowship and who would have championed the !Taxol! race if not for Bill Bornmann's shop's faux pas and Danishefsky's team's (trusting) oversight. ... well a group wanted to assuage John and show unit integrity. So the Great Wendy Young likely on hiatus from the nice fellow (a Physicist!) whom she eventually married [and who was disparaged by Tularik, but alas, she muddled through, yes? ... when becoming a Director at Celera ... and thence [SJD likes to use that word, oui?] to Genentech ... along with Larry Snyder (see below) and another Oracle type person take John Masters out. Wendy arranges a trip to a Bridge and Tunnel Crowd (read: !QUEENS!
place (Maxwell's Plum, the one that used to be in NY as opposed to SF!) ... and on the first beer John pontificates (i paraphrase): '...that hooked nose J*w B*stard ...' (referring to KC Nicolaou) ... Wendy, Lawrence and the Oracle look at each other as we were there as teammates, but more importantly as FRIENDS of John Masters and Lawrence and the Oracle happen to be members of the tribe that Dr. Masters just disparaged ... so we tried to explain to John that KC is very likely a B*stard, but he is not a member of the tribe he just disparaged and that OUR fearless leader (who, too, was very likely a B*stard) was a member of that very same tribe! ... well after a beer or two we left the John Travolta / Saturday Night Live-ish hang out (the author of this note wanted to take a shower) ... and received a profuse apology (which was very much appreciated and accepted) from Dr. B*stard, I mean Dr. Masters. John's actually a champ ... in different times he would have been a Tenured Professor if not for his antecedents in academia who were awarded NIH First Awards, but were unable to secure NIH RO1s (in the then [as opposed to the current] 'trying times') and were therefore denied tenure ... and so John has championed Big Pharma.
Now Dr. B*stard (SJD, as opposed to KCN) was miffed at Dr. Snyder who was (at that point) melding with the woman who would become the love of his life and wife ... Professor SJD was upset with Larry taking a day off (even though SJD was out of town by sun down on Friday until sun down on Saturday) ... and actually wrote a note (a poison pen letter!) ... left in his mail box ... telling him his services were no longer required ... to hear Larry cry as he read this letter was heart wrenching, and one can't help but think (the) God(s) was/were angry and punished SJD into a 3rd place !Taxol! initiative because of the way he's wont to UNNECESSARILY treat people.
[And remember, the Welch Award in Chemistry has a 2/1/* nomination deadline!! GOOD LUCK SAM, you deserve it, yes?? !!]
Then there was the time SJD was going to lose money (perhaps $10K) because he didn't fill out and send back a form relative to a biotech either whose board he sat on or for whom he consulted ... and the biotech grew up and was either purchased or merged ... or something similar ... Danishefsky blamed everyone for its loss, and swore up and down he never received it ... of course what happened was that it was received at his Columbia Office, but never retrieved it. After a few weeks he dumped some mail at Sloan and when the letter turned up, having denied receiving it (to high heavens and to the legal office of the biotech company in question) ... Sam just crumpled it up and said it was an unimportant letter ... [HONEST, HONEST Danishefsky]
The NEW Math: One day Sarah Danishefsky who deigned (at that point in time) to show up at Sloan perhaps 50% time (during a good week!
and who kvetched on the phone about an inability to check her stocks (YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK!) ... was miraculously changed from a 54% employee to a full time employee. The administrator who handled the payroll asked Sarah if she was a full time employee and she said 'no' ... so the employee reported the boo boo ... OH WELL ... and then Sarah was upset when the administrator saddled with the time cards recused himself from signing SAM's name on the forms verifying the 100% employee formerly known as Prince [redacted] Sarah Danishefsky ... for some reason Sam didn't want to sign those forms either! But after interacting with the home office / headquarters ... Sarah Danishefsky had an epiphany and handled the processing of those forms. For some unknown reason, upon checking, Sarah's sheet was the ONLY one NOT signed by anybody!!! THE NEW MATH at work all for the lovely and honest and genuine SARAH E. DANISHEFSKY
Let's end on a lighter note: SJD misplaces his docket (satchel) filled with very important papers. He's upset and acting like a baby in a wet diaper. Dr. Sarah Danishefsky deigns to show up for the 'show' part of her no show job and is put on a special mission to find the portfolio. After a 3 fister (3 bangs of a clenched fist on her knee), after the Awesome Professor denies ... (see below) ... after a handful of hours, the portfolio is retrieved from where Danishefsky left it: AT THE ICE CREAM SHOP ... of course, he denied going there! Honest, honest Danishefsky.
An Open Letter to Professor Samuel J. Danishefsky, his spouse, Dr. Sarah E. Danishefsky and MSKCC,
It's hard to imagine how you (SJD, SED) manage to get up every day, look at yourselves in the mirror and carry on. Yes, the science is important, but that does not give you the right to treat people the way you have. Do you think that people don't know of the disingenuousness that emanates from MSKCC, the Bioorganic Laboratory and yourselves? Sarah is a pig and Sam is a weasel. What's sad about this is that there is no need for such conduct. ... you're likely going to get your money anyway. So, as you enter your twilight year(s) ... it's so, so sad that you are who you are and that you've acted as you have. God WILL count the guilt along with the gelt. Remember that. Sam, that soapstone statue/figure on your desk? It's somewhat phallic. It was gifted by KCN, yes? Could it be that he was calling you a d*ck? Your birthday is coming up, yes? Is it time to vote for yourself for another award? As to Sloan, when will be the next time you need to cover up, slither away from, or dispatch on pretext those who rightfully call to the fore system environmental health and safety oversight that stands to once again harm your employees or impeach the credibility of the research conducted in MSKCC laboratories? For Ed Mahoney, has the MSKCC Facilities Staff been appropriately fitted with their new standard issue Clown Costumes yet? Is there any truth to the word on the street that the Feds were closing in on MSKCC's erstwhile Physician In Chief (Golde) before he killed himself? MSKCC, the best cancer care anywhere, as long as it's consistent with the prospective profit of the Institute and/or its senior staff. “Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer]; Shame on you Drs. Danishefsky. Shame on you Sloan Kettering ... YOU KNOW BETTER.
[typo]:
As to Sloan, when will be the next time you need to cover up, slither away from, or dispatch on pretext those who rightfully call to the fore systemic environmental health and safety oversight problems that stand to once again harm your employees or impeach the credibility of the research conducted in MSKCC laboratories?
MSKCCheats/TheDanishefskyDeception leak of the day!:
Covering for Corey!:
re: http://www.nytimes.com/1998/11/29/magazine/lethal-chemistry-at-harvard.html?scp=1&sq=lethal%20chemistry&st=cse
Professor Danishefsky has sat on the Harvard University Department of Chemistry Scientific Advisory Board ... after the above incident, [Jason Alton's altruistic suicide by cyanide] ... the board was in a difficult position, but as the board members included Nobel Prize aspirants and Corey was an alum of that accolade, and alums get to vote for future candidates ... what do you think happened? were the wagons circled and did all Cover for Corey?
Does Christine Hickey (MSKCC Employee, Public Affairs Dept., various titles including 'spokesperson', 'director of communications', etc ...) ... have a substance abuse concern in her family (cocaine abuse?, this per Ms. Sara Frei*) ... Think of the symbolism if there is truth to this ... MSKCC's Director of Communications ... psychoactive drugs?
John Gunn is the Executive (most senior) Vice President at MSKCC ... the MSKCC CFO who reports directly to him has stated:
“Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer];
Do you think this tack would have been instituted without Mr. Gunn's approval? One might wonder if Mr. Gunn profited off of Ariad Stock's curiously miraculous (10,000% [100x]) rise of yore. Did you?
Avice Meehan is the erstwhile VP of Public Affairs (MSKCC's Propoganda) Department. According to Ms. Sara Frei* Ms. Meehan is somewhat sapphic [no value judgment up/down/indifferent here ...]. One might wonder if Ms. Meehan profited off of Ariad Stock's curiously miraculous (10,000% [100x]) rise of yore. Did you? Ms. Meehan's shop has in the past been called on to (auto)nominate (via proxy!) Professor Danishefsky for scientific accolades. So it would be nice to keep 'the help' happy.
MSKCC Facilities' Folly 'leak' of the day ... water is wont to leak regularly through live recessed fluorescent light fixtures, literally passing the live prongs and pooling in the plastic cover. It has been postulated that the water leak(s) are due to faulty filtered water conduits (!water porous joints!, a Facilities oversight?) ... that run along with (!faulty!) HVAC conduits. If there are regular leaks (faults) in the house filtered water conduits, notwithstanding the super-powers of Bernoulli's Principle, if water can leak out, cannot contaminants get in, thereby impeaching the purity of the water? Being that filtered water is used somewhat universally in ski/mskcc experiments, would this MSKCC Facilities Management shortcoming impeach the credibility of reaction conditions of experiments conducted in the building?
That's it for now!
MSKCC, the BEST Cancer Care ANYWHERE, as long as it is consistent with adding to Sloan's (or its employee's) revenue stream(s). BOO, MSKCC, you know better. How about providing leadership by example. We know you're capable of doing so.
!MSKCCheats/TheDanishefskyDeception! Leak(s) of the Day ... :
(a) (Susan) Campbell Echols ... aka DWU (Dangerous When Unmedicated) ... Campbell was a temp in the Bioorganic Lab. She is trained as an actress. Claims to be the daughter of alcoholics [Washington Beltway Boozers]. Campbell worked for No Show Job Sarah Danishefsky and would attempt a monkey see monkey do work ethic. Campbell would often be seemingly AWOL, but if sought it turned out she'd be locked in Sarah Danishefsky's office, 'practicing her lines' and when confronted with the need to complete tasks she'd state that she was 'all alone' ... 'in New York' ... One prominent Bioorganic Post Doc once stated that it was obvious to anyone after speaking with Campbell for just a few minutes that she had serious psychological problems.
(b) Dali's Letter! ... SJD would pen reference letters and like Pavlov's Dogs, Post Docs would be 'good' until the prof signed off on the letter (for either academia or big pharma). SJD hired his own post doc (usually considered a faux pas) even if at his other venue (Columbia v. Sloan Kettering). Dali's letter stated that he was the BEST Sam has ever seen and even invoked Matt, Dirk, Peter, Tom, Eric (who once referred to KCN as 'that BASTARD'!) ... of course, stating that those (Shair, Trauner, Seeberger) not see the letter. ... Well as time has passed let's see what has happened. Dali got tenure at Columbia, while purportedly scr*wing his star grad student who was purportedly fabricating (irreproducable) data [ordering pure intermediates for methodology experiments and running Mass Spec and/or NMRs on them as proof of her work] ... unfortunately high caliber students had to redeploy after Dali backed the culprit (Sezen), losing a handful of their young adult lives' progress because of the Little Sh*t who herself absconded to Europe to get a second! Ph.D. Dali retracted ~ 7 tenure facilitating papers, yet is somehow still standing. Meanwhile, the other aforementioned 2nd tiers, have managed to muddle through without any cheating!
(c) Dotting I's and Crossing T's! ... keeping proper lab notebooks: it has been reported (word on the street!) that Craig Coburn kept two lab notebooks ... and that Dongfang Meng (who would urinate on the floor in Sam Danishefsky's bathroom, such that people would have to come out of the lavatory on tippy toes as the 'yellow river' ran between the tiles above the grout ... ) ... didn't always sign and date his lab notebooks. Were any of the lab notebooks 'retrofitted' when Intellectual Property concerns were raised in tight races?
(d) One wonders if Sam and Sarah Danishefsky realize that their [egregiously unnecessary] actions at times personify negative stereotypes relative to their tribe (and, too, the tribe of the author of this note). ... completely unnecessary. BOO.
OK, enough for now ... hope you enjoy!
!MSKCCheats/TheDanishefskyDeception Leak of the Day!:
A well like Postdoc in the Bioorganic Lab has a young child, his first and is proud as a papa can be. The child has chronic, though hopefully managed, medical problems. The parents bring to the attention of their Pediatrician an episode of this medical concern (via phone), but doc assuages the parents' fears invoking a 'this has happened before' scenario ... and that addressment of the concern can wait. The doc was (on the golf course??) ... not around. So sadly, the baby died. The parents were too trusting. A sad, sad and quite possibly unnecessary ending to a young life. Showing unit integrity for their colleague and friend (something foreign to the Danishefskys??) the colleague/friends [in variance with the otherwise very private services] asked for and were granted permission by the family to attend the chapel service, but not the graveside service. Begrudgingly, the Danishefskys deigned to allow this absence from the lab and the team rented minivans from the preferred MSKCC vendor. The goal was to return early afternoon to the lab. In spite of pleas relatve to a time critical window, the workers at the car rental took too long to organize the vans and combined with unexpected traffic on the turnpike the Bioorganic colleagues arrived as the service was ending. As this was before everyone had cell phones, we were not near easy access to a pay phone and did not want to miss the second service for a roadside stop. The team was given a variance to stay for the graveside service by the distraught colleague and his family. When the team left the service it stopped to have lunch (the Danishefskys were aware of the planned respit). At that point one employee phoned in and reported the delay and the reason for it. The nebulous and curiously full time employee, Sarah Danishefsky, had not come to the lab yet as she was wont to 'check my stocks' in the morning, so the office temp, Campbell Echols (see above, DWU) took the message and stated she'd pass it on to the (leadership by example??) Lab Manager (who like most days had just not come to work yet even though it was mid/late morning). Upon return Sarah Danishefsky attempted to read the riot act to the teammate who ran the paper chase (Editorial shop) for the lovely Danishefskys, implying that he purposely deceived the pure and honest Danishefskys relative to how long he and the team would be away from the lab. So it was reported that the change in ETA was phoned in and that as Sarah Danishefsky for some reason had just not come to work yet to earn her hard earned money and that her (Sarah's) admin took the message. Campbell denied receiving any call. Thankfully, another postdoc was present at the pay phone and overheard his colleague phone in the delay. Sarah had wanted to dispatch the employee who called in the delay for holding up Danishefsky progress. She was also upset with him for keeping the postdocs away. Once again, the lovely Danishefsky's selfishness shines through. It was so sad to see Sarah Danishefsky feigning concern for the distraught postdoc when attendance at his son's funeral might lead to the loss of a day of cumulative postdoc labor. Some malpracticing peds doc screws up big time, a trusting and pressured post doc in variance with his gut feeling allows assuagement, a child dies (possibly unnecessarily [at that point]), colleague/friends genuinely show support and 'how am i going to check my stocks'/no show job Sarah Danishefsky is upset and wants to fire a teammate for losing a few extra hours cumulative postdoc (and his manuscript editing) work, when it had nothing to do with that employee and Sarah's dingbat temp misstated the facts.
!Class Trip! ... on (that or another) Bioorganic minivan trip the Bioorganic Editorial Spec. happened to sit next to Dali the great [of don't f*ck your grad student/Dr. Retraction fame] who as we neared the NY skyline, asked 'can i borrow some money' ... to which he replied 'sure' (assuming Dali wanted $20, pocket money) ... Dali asked for a few thousand dollars, which the modestly paid [reference: Sarah Danishefsky has a no show job] employee did not have (and would not have given if he did). ... so the stunned colleague asked another (Dali's ancillary lab mate) what's up ... and it turned out that Dali the great just assumed credit cards in the US were meant to gift Dali with money and he abused them and they were taken away. So when Dali had to go for talks or academic app. tour he had to borrow from Peter to pay Paul ...
eventually, to be continued ...
A well liked postdoc ... to see Sarah Danishefsky feigning concern when invocation of said concern might interfere with a few hours of the lab's work flow ... is but one example of the intermittently palpable disingenuousness that emanates from MSKCC ... it wouldn't have mattered anyway as Bill ('Bird-Brain' [according to Professor Danishefsky]) Bornmann's shop was to provide a fatally flawing 'processed' segment for an otherwise first and goal slam duck victory in a high profile (billion dollar molecule) natural product synthesis. ... accordingly, according to a Wiki* article, (paraphrased) ... Danishefsky provided a THIRD synthesis that RESEMBLED KCNicolaous!!! ... good work
Bill!! thataboy!!
!MKSCCheats/TheDanishefskyDeception! ... Here's a good one:
Above mentioned dingbat, Campbell Echols, an !Actress! yesiree ... so Spalding Gray and his demons ... multiple suicide attempts and then, oh-oh WHERE'S SPALDING?? ... calling all Spalding Gray search partiers ... !Go Campbell Go! ... gotta come to work late because WE are Looking For Spalding! ... it's nice to be part of a group ... what a shm*ck.
!Sarah's Choking! ... one day, Sarah Danishefsky deigned to come to work (her 'full time job', the one your tax dollars are paying for!) ... Edit/Graph Spec. is busy with grants, graphics, papers &c. ... and then who comes running down the hallway? Dingbat CAMPBELL Echols ... What Now?? ... SARAH'S CHOKING? ... Ah ha ... perhaps a bright spot in this otherwise dismal day!! She's really choking?!? ... FOR REAL ... THERE IS A GOD!!! What happened? She made POPCORN with her hot air popcorn machine (great, so Sarah has a no show job and when she deigns to come to work ... she makes hot air popcorn ... before she gets down to work, that really hard work like 'CHECKING MY STOCKS' ... Ariad, Ariad, Ariad, Ariad ... 10,000% ... What to do?? What first comes to mind?? Tie up the phone line so no one can call an ambulance if necessary ... OK, Pizza Joe's?? Yes, i'll have a large pizza, thank you ... click ... Can we call the ambulance now?? NO ... i FORGOT ... we NEED to order PEPERONI on the PIZZA ... and HAM TOO!! ... Gag, cough, cough, cough ... and up comes the popcorn that went down the wrong pipe in Sarah's throat ... Awwwwwwwwwwww. Too bad.
! MSKCCheats/TheDanishefskyDeception ! Leak of the day ... so let's get this straight!!! Where in that Bible that the Danishefsky's thump does it condone the cravenly self serving tack that the Danishefsky's take? Double billing travel reimbursements, embargoing known information from desperate cancer patients, having a no show job [your tax dollars at work!], being a day trader [your tax dollars at work!], pressuring clinicians to continue enrollment in clinical trials against a clinician's better judgment when large milestone dependent royalty payments lay in the balance! SHAME ON YOU Drs. Danishefsky ... EVERYONE will know of your scoundrelic and disingenuous behavior! SHAME, SHAME, SHAME ...
Dr. Sarah Danishefsky has stated that Gus (Gustave Bernhardt) is not very good, but that Mr. (Jim) Quirk is OK. THANK YOU SARAH!!
!BOOM! ... Craig Coburn is reacting aggressively ... his waste cauldron seems to begin to runneth over ... he pulls down the sash ... BOOM ... Thankfully the sash [~ bullet proof like glass blast shield] takes MOST of the hit while 2-4" is exposed. The ceramic magnetic / hot plate becomes shrapnel and is expunged from the fume hoods (the ones that have curious MSKCCFacilities' What Me Worry Cross Contaminations) ... The poor fellow (Kevin!) who likely has NEVER harmed a fly in his entire life ... takes a hit in his back (thankfully covered with a shirt and lab coat). Nonetheless in a few minutes a welt forms. The sash looked like a road map. Admin calls Safety ... safety is busy, (possibly on the 20th floor [then the environs of the Institute's President] ... but comes to the phone when apprised that 'we had an explosion' ... luckily, the CEO of the insurance company that underwrites Sloan's insurance was on site!! (BUT SARAH DANISHEFSKY WASN'T ... imagine that!!!) ... Sarah shows up late morning, and quickly fixes her hair!! ... lovely, just in time for the medical photographers who were shooting the devestation on RRL 13 ... one of the floors where MSKCCFacilities would not deign to install proper ductwork controls ...
What would Jack Fox say??
! MSKCCheats / TheDanishefskyDeception ! Leaks of the Day:
(a) just heard an MSKCC commercial on NPR ... wherein they state they provide 'compassionate care' and 'clinical trials' ... of course if consistent with contribution to the revenue streams of MSKCC and/or its researchers! Keep up the good work!
(b) Don Wiley ... a Virologist at Harvard ... disappeared while attending an SAB type function ... his car found unattended on a bridge over the Mississippi ... and he was found ~ 10 days later. Don's death was ruled an 'accident' ... he just happened to fall off of a bridge. Don was pals with Greg Verdine. Verdine is affiliated with Ariad. Was Don in on Ariad's 10,000% [100x] curiously swift and very large stock rise ca. 1999/2000 prior to the (bio and thence) tech stock bubble burst? If so were any (real and/or imagined) stock accruals kosher or could he have received curiously conveniently timed information relative to IP legal issues being settled amicably? John Deutch, erstwhile DCI (Director, Central Intelligence) Agency under Clinton, faux pas-ed while bringing laptops with classified information off of (CIA's) campus ... received a curiously timed midnight pardon from Clinton while Hillary was proverbially stealing the silverware from the White House ... Deutch has been affiliated with Ariad too! ... Professor Danishefsky's brother runs a high profile boutiquey division at UBS (formerly at Merril). His daughter (who worked with that UBS team) had a most horrible and untimely demise [http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/manhattan/victim_kin_slam_slay_injustice_7hzPALHXxTvrpXyf0g6bSM]; ... Ariad ...
@MSKCCheats, re above (Don Wiley, etc.) posting: so might there be a positive correlation ... Ariad 'affiliates' (and friends/family/coworkers, etc. ...) ... and possible insider 'tipees'?? ... It would be interesting if Chelsea Clinton just happened to have purchased Ariad stock during an interestingly convenient and opportunistic time frame; The Merrill/UBS/Danishefsky Group is likely strictly adherent to SEC rules and regs so it is unlikely that any curiously times dissemination of 'insider' Ariad information would have occurred.
re: MSKCC, the BEST cancer care anywhere ... 'Call Memorial Sloan Kettering First' ... just heard yet another commercial on the radio relative to MSKCC, imploring cancer stricken patients to contact 'MSKCC First' ... just don't call up Dr. Sarah Danishefsky, Administrative Manager, Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory at MSKCC, as in the past she's disingenuously and selfishly instructed colleagues to embargo known information relative to the availability of clinical trials conducted on MSKCC's campus on clinical trial candidates that compete with those that (hopefully [had not yet left the starting gate] would) emanate from the Bioorganic Chemistry Lab. This is an egregious COI or CONFLICT OF INTEREST. Sarah Danishefsky is NOT a clinician. It has been reported, e.g. by Bill Bornmann that David Spriggs (who oversees clinical trials at Sloan) was upset with Professor Samuel J. Danishefsky because of the leverage he was trying to press on Spriggs to continue enrollment in clinical trials of a Bioorganic (in house) drug candidate against Spriggs' better (and unlike the Danishefskys, clinical) judgment. Very high 'milestone royalty payments' [e.g. if a candidate completes a clinical trial phase (a milestone/hurdle) then large sums are paid] lay in the balance. Conflicts of Interest at MSKCC? Rest assured Sloan has circled the wagons and conjured and synchronized their cover stories and attempts to sweep under the rug these ethics concerns, just as they have the egregious environmental health and safety issues that affect both employee and public safety AND reaction conditions on (amongst other publications) clinical trial candidates. BOO MSKCC, you know better. Awkward re MSKCC's Facilities team that doesn't know which way is up.
! MSKCC / TheDanishefskyDeception ! Leak of the Day:
!!PURLOINED!! ... this just in ... it has been reported (by Bill [Bird-Brain (according to Professor Danishefsky)]) ... that Professor Danishefsky (in the past) has been BANNED from CONSULTING at a major pharmaceutical firm (Merck, Rahway) ... after Merck employees were concerned that Danishefsky lifted ideas from Merck during a consultancy visit. Danishefsky denies charges. Later, Dr. David Askin, Process Chemist at Merck Rahway states that he will attempt to facilitate the 'rehabilitation' (from Merck's perspective) process ... so as to allow Danishefsky to consult once again at that site. Sticky Fingered?? Can you imagine what it would be like if Professor Danishefsky and Dr. Sarah Danishefsky worked at BYU and was charged with abiding by their honor code(s) of conduct.
! Happy Birthday Sam ! (March ~ 6 , 1936) ! Happy Birthday Sam !
Important Research ... CHECK!
Mentor of many high caliber scientific progeny ... CHECK!
Intermittently disingenuous to a fault! ... CHECK!
Intermittently displaying uberCOIs (conflicts of interest) ... YEP!
Intermittently displaying lapses in use of a moral compass (they must have one ... after all that bible thumping) ... YEP!
Spouse: cravenly self serving! ... YESIREEE!!
KUTGW (keep up the good work) Sam! (Sarah, too!!!) .... and don't forget to get those seating charts right ... may influence the Nobel vote ...
! God ! knows all Sam. On your birthday, remember that. He sees all ... the guilt along with the gelt. ...
!MSKCCheats/TheDanishefskyDeception! Leak of the Day:
MSKCCFacilitiesFollies: MSKCC having had to ABANDON a building post poisoning their employees (with Carbon MONOXIDE!!), denying it for years, dispatching (FIRING) on pretext completely selfless long term, positively reviewed employees who appropriately reported infrastructure (MSKCCFacilities!) shortcomings ... has another MSKCCFacilitiesFolly: MSKCC saw fit to NOT install ductwork controls in a laboratory building strewn with toxins (chemicals, poisons, etc.) ... a CHLORINE spill that permeated the building via ductwork AND fume hoods, evincing that MSKCCFacilities was not in control of the internal environment ... attempting to assuage a rightfully concerned staff (research and otherwise) issues a general denial statement ... when appropriately challenged (in writing and invoking OSHA), IRA LERNER, DIRECTOR FACILITIES calls selfless employee who penned rebuttal to (likely ghosted) and clearly inaccurate assuagement attempt ... THREATENS MSKCC Employee: 'you upset a lot of people' (when appropriately filing complaint). This knucklehead (IRA LERNER) was merely trying to cover up his shop's foibles and incompetence. OSHA has since substantiated concerns at MSKCC, as has the EPA. Boo. MSKCC's propoganda (Public Affairs) Department never stops with the 'Best Cancer Care Anywhere' and 'Call MSKCC First' ... as long as you can contribute to its revenue stream ... as to MSKCC's Facilities, it's a world wide joke and currently headed by VP Ed Mahoney. ... clown costumes for mskcc facilities employees!!
!MSKCCheats! ... Facilities Follies ... Leak of the Day!: ...
Above mentioned (IRA LERNER) Director, Facilities Management MSKCC [Ed Mahoney is MSKCC Facilities' VP], subsequently denies as 'impossible' known MSKCC/SKI/Rockefeller Research Labs infrastructure shortcomings, inclusive of 'cross contamination' between supposedly mutually exclusive fume hoods and is vociferously rebutted by MSKCC 'Member' / Researcher who stated that (paraphrasing) by burying their heads in the sand, Sloan will be responsible as 'SOMEONE IS GOING TO GET KILLED ONE DAY' (i.e. because of the cross contamination that Sloan Facilities/Safety REFUSES to address, a researcher working with inert chemicals may one day be exposed to a lethal exposure of another chemical [e.g. cyanide]....) ... ditto, malfunctioning ductwork (remember, Sloan found it appropriate to NEVER install ductwork controls !!) ...
Dr. Non Clinician Sarah Danishefsky ... have you steered any desperate cancer stricken patients in a direction consistent with your possible financial betterment, as opposed to the patients' betterment??
! Remember, God knows all ! ...
Today Lent Starts for some, for many ... for rhetorical reasons, maybe some people (even those at holier than thou Sloan) who are (might) apt to be, just can't help being, and/or like being disingenuous ... can give it up for a while? just a little while? how about when dealing with cancer stricken people? give it a go. you'll feel better, too.
... re the above, ok for MSKCC AND its staff, inclusive of Drs. Danishefsky and its CFO ...
! MSKCCheats / TheDanishefskyDeception ! Leak of the day: Drs. Schkeryantz and Snyder are at a bar local to Sloan. Some old (and inebriated) fellow while purging his bladder stands in the stall next to Dr. Schkeryantz and (after looking at Dr. S): (paraphrased) ' ... oh my, you're a BOY!?! ...' after which Dr. S proceeds to pummel the old man, resulting in a banishment from that bar. At least this tale is not of a future professor tossing a heavy object off of a roof onto a patio laden with incoming graduate students, staff, faculty and children at a high profile Ivy League University. Poor Judgment, nonetheless ... Lovely.
It is Purim. Drs. Sarah and Sam Danishefsky have you considered getting dolled up in a 'genuine' costume ... as opposed to being disingenuous when not necessary? Try it. It might feel good!
Ed (Mahoney) ... MSKCC VP Facilities (mis??)Management ... anyone at Sloan build a laboratory building lately and decide that it's no biggie to NOT install ductwork controls, rendering necessary airflow control impossible? is mskcc facilities wearing those clown costumes yet?
! MSKCCheats / TheDanishefskyDeception ! Leak(s) of the day:
Dr. X, aka Dr. Xenia Beebe (now Searle!) ... settles for Abbott Labs when most other companies are put off by her personality. This is hard to swallow [redacted] fathom: Famous (purported) comment by Dr. Beebe (paraphrased) ... 'the key to a good marriage is a good bl*w j*b.' Way to go Xenia! It has been reported that Dr. X's original research proposal initially presented to Abbott was rejected ... even by Abbott. Do over! Even too low for Abbott. He he he ...
Has MSKCC voted for itself for an award for a lovely research lab building? after all, they certainly have a pretty darn tootin' good record ... for keystone copish construction.
! MSKCCheats / TheDanishefskyDeception ! LEAK of the Day
Standout Graduate Student Dongfang Meng, whilst invoking his superpowers of chemistry, if not documentation (if you know what i mean .... like signing your laboratory notebook on a regular basis, if you know what i mean ... and not signing it retroactively or backdating ... if you know what i mean ...) ... had some personal hygiene, um, concerns ... he was not a very good, um, bombardier ... and would regularly miss the bowl when PEEING ... so if one used the lavatory after DFM one would have to tip toe around the YELLOW RIVER that would often find its way into the crevices aka grout between 1" or so tiles. Yum Yum ... on brick oven pizza night one would have to order at least one extra pie for DFM ... that's cool. Hats off to DONG* but please aim that DONG* correctly!!!
MSKCC Disingenuous redux de jour ... Sarah ... did you try to steer any desperate cancer patients in a manner consistent with your stock portfolio? Well remember, GOD knows all, notwithstanding any bible thumping one does.
MSKCC Facilities Folly redux de jour ... Iwa Lerner and/or Ed Baloney Mahoney ... don't forget to actually install those ductwork controls in the future. BAAAAAAAAAAAD MSKCC Facilities. ...
Boo. MSKCC, you know better.
A hypothetical: Ariad (Aria) stock baselined at ~ .50 (50 cents!) ca. 1999 when other biotechs joined the fray of halcyon hype due to an intellectual property he said she said broohaha. When the matter was settled the stock rocketed to ~ 48$ (almost a 100X or 10,000% increase) in perhaps 4 months (from ~ October 99 through March 00) [when Clinton and Blair had a joint press conference stating that genomic information will be shared sending a wrench into possible patenting of genes and perhaps precipitating the biotech and thence tech stock bubble burst]. Insiders at Ariad (e.g. founding scientists, etc.) may have been privy to WHEN the settlement was to occur and may have been generous with this information. John Deutch (erstwhile DCI, Director Central Intelligence) admonished for faux pas-ing (laptops [v. dancers] at Starbucks??) and subsequently pardoned seconds to midnight by Clinton when Hillary was proverbially stealing the White House silverware ... has been involved with Ariad [Director??] as he's a member of the proverbial Cambridge Biotech Curia. Wouldn't it be funny if Chelsea (only a hypothetical!) just happened to have purchased Ariad stock during an interestingly convenient time frame? Don Wiley one of the (!conspiracy theorists beware!) post 9/11 missing/dead microbiologists just happened to leave his running car on a bridge over the Mississippi whilst attending a BSA (board of scientific advisors) type meeting and fell into the river ... to be found perhaps ~10 days later. Don was pals with Ariad insiders. if you (one, you, me, i, whomever) picked up 5K of Ariad stock at a convenient time and sold it the day before the Clinton Blair press conference you could have made a cool ~$500K!! When esteemed institutions such as mskcc have CFOs who state: “Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer] ... one must remember that the very people or institutions we trust implicitly are not always what they seem and that the forces of commerce (and, too, greed and self servitude) do indeed influence actions. insider stock carpe diems are not immune to this premise.
! MSKCCheats / TheDanishefskyDeception ! Leak of the Day!: ...
It has been reported (e.g. by Bill Bornmann [who has been referred to as a 'bird brain' by Dr. Danishefsky]) that a clinician at MSKCC with clinical oversight of clinical trials [!Dr. David Spriggs!] conducted at that venerable Institution was 'upset' with Dr. Danishefsky because of his pressured lobbying to continue enrollment of patients in clinical trials conducted at Sloan of (a) drug candidate(s) [epothilone derivatives] that emanate(s) from the Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory (Dr. Danishefsky is its PI/Principal Investigator) in variance with the clinician's better judgment. Germane is the fact that very large milestone dependent royalty payments are contingent upon completion of a particular 'phase' of a clinical trial. Might an overseeing physician at Sloan assuage a powerful non-clinician researcher by gifting him with a few pawns (patients at an Institute that claims to provide 'the best cancer care anywhere') so he and the Institute could receive a large royalty payment? Rest assuredly that Sloan has conjured and synchronized its cover stories relative to this (and other) curious anomalies. MSKCC ... 'the best cancer care anywhere' ... as long as that care is consistent with adding to Sloan's revenue stream [wink, wink, wink]! Keep Up The Good Work Sloan ... But remember God knows all ... you are SUPPOSED to be our hero! You ARE supposed to provide leadership by example. Shame on you MSKCC you unnecessarily rotten scoundrel(s).
! This Just In ... from NPR !! ... A hypothetical: Ariad (Aria) stock baselined at ~ .50 (50 cents!) ca. 1999 when other biotechs joined the fray of halcyon hype due to an intellectual property he said she said broohaha. When the matter was settled the stock rocketed to ~ 48$ (almost a 100X or 10,000% increase) in perhaps 4 months (from ~ October 99 through March 00) [when Clinton and Blair had a joint press conference stating that genomic information will be shared sending a wrench into possible patenting of genes and perhaps precipitating the biotech and thence tech stock bubble burst]. Insiders at Ariad (e.g. founding scientists, etc.) may have been privy to WHEN the settlement was to occur and may have been generous with this information. John Deutch (erstwhile DCI, Director Central Intelligence) admonished for faux pas-ing (laptops [v. dancers] at Starbucks??) and subsequently pardoned seconds to midnight by Clinton when Hillary was proverbially stealing the White House silverware ... has been involved with Ariad [Director??] as he's a member of the proverbial Cambridge Biotech Curia. Wouldn't it be funny if Chelsea (only a hypothetical!) just happened to have purchased Ariad stock during an interestingly convenient time frame? Don Wiley one of the (!conspiracy theorists beware!) post 9/11 missing/dead microbiologists just happened to leave his running car on a bridge over the Mississippi whilst attending a BSA (board of scientific advisors) type meeting and fell into the river ... to be found perhaps ~10 days later. Don was pals with Ariad insiders. if you (one, you, me, i, whomever) picked up 5K of Ariad stock at a convenient time and sold it the day before the Clinton Blair press conference you could have made a cool ~$500K!! When esteemed institutions such as mskcc have CFOs who state: “Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer] ... one must remember that the very people or institutions we trust implicitly are not always what they seem and that the forces of commerce (and, too, greed and self servitude) do indeed influence actions. insider stock carpe diems are not immune to this premise ...!Let’s extrapolate (on mskccheats' comment above)! … for rhetorical purposes: who might benefit from a tip from a scientific founder of Ariad’s ... real and/or imagined ‘tippees’ … the head (VP) of Sloan’s Public Affairs Department (PA often processes nomination packets for awards [Boy Scout -> Nobel!] Avice Meehan is the erstwhile VP of PA of MSKCC!) … the Executive Vice President of MSKCC (the head business person at Sloan … John Gunn is the EVP of MSKCC) … Intellectual Property related persons at Sloan (Jennifer [nee] Brooks is the erstwhile admin for Bioorganic’s docket at Sloan and Andrew Maslow is the in house IP counsel) … Scientific Colleagues (Neal Rosen, Howard Scher are ‘Members’ at MSKCC) … only hypothetical … what if a sibling of a Scientific Founder / Insider ran an in house boutique formerly at Merrill [currently at UBS!] (The Danishefsky Group!) and a member of that group had a mysterious demise (the niece of the Insider, the daughter of the head of the financial boutique subdivision) … what if a stalwart [someone who would have the backbone to stand up to curious anomalies at Sloan] and loved physician surgeon curiously happened to be run over by an ambulance [Jeanne Petrek 1948 – 2005] … another curious demise … Sloan’s erstwhile Physician In Chief (took the two whole method to shuffle off this mortal coil … [self inflicted gun shot wound to the head] … word on the street is that he was suffering from a virulent cancer AND that the Feds were closing in … then there is !Ed Sauseville! … who administered the Bioorganic’s RAID (rapid application to industrial development) grant while at the NIH to facilitate its epothilone development [curiously, Sarah Danishefsky in but one instance of challenged ethics instructed a colleague to embargo known information relative to the availability of epothilone clinical trial candidates [from desperate cancer patients and/or their proxies ... in variance with Sloan's motto, 'the best cancer care anywhere'] developed at BMS that competed with those developed in house at Sloan!] and then curiously joined the SAB (scientific advisory board) of the very biotech that purchased Sloan’s portfolio of epothilones (Kosan, a company subsequently purchased by BMS). … Neal Rosen, too, sat on Kosan’s SAB … sver arbitiers and possibly COIs (conflicts of interest) … hard work and creative genius deserves its rewards, but there need to be checks and balances to ensure that craven self servitude does not carry the day at the expense of patient safety. Got that Sloan?
! MSKCCheats / TheDanishefskyDeception ! Leak of the Day!: ...
... one time, double nought, the Editor of this missive was on the short end of a smirk from TheMurph ... and reported it to TheAustrian ... (no mustache on this one) ... who after asking 'where'd you get this crappy yellow book?' ... guffawed a major league LOL and proclaimed: MURPHY'S A WIMP ... now DoubleNought doesn't necessarily concur with that comment, but doesn't necessarly think TheMurph is either Starsky or Hutch ... perhaps Dr. X (BB) could inflate his ego by providing the proverbial magic tonic (vide supra) for a successful marriage to TheMurph?
Murphy the Wimp: So the infamous Danishefsky lab is strewn with A- -> A+ types, all of whom were the Derek Jeter (or A-Rod ... depending upon your perspective) of their respective labs before they came to The Brilliant Man's Lab ... upon their arrival some of them were confronted with being just an everyday player as opposed to batting 1->4 ... if you know what i mean (and there's nuttin' wrong with that!) ... one fellow, nice guy, smart guy, ok guy ... but not a Harvard Professor or Merck Discovery potential person (if you know what i mean) ... The Murph (extrapolate upon the Fonz ...) ... came to Gotham and bought a Starsky and Hutch Leather Blazer (cooooooooool daddy-o!
! MSKCCheats / TheDanishefskyDeception ! Leak of the Day:
re: mucophagy and rhinotillexamania
One must wonder if the Danishefskys (Sarah and Sam) are aware that they pick their nose and eat it in front of others and if so, if they are doing it as some form of trying to let one know that they are better than you.
! MSKCCheats / TheDanishefskyDeception ! Leak of the Day:
MSKCCMilquetoast of the Day: Gus Bernhardt, aka Gustave Bernhardt: Jim Quirk's puppet in MSKCC's 'Research Resources Management' office. Paraphrasing Sarah Danishefsky: 'Jim [Quirk] is OK [competent], but Gus is not very good [of the same caliber]' ... got that Gus?
! MSKCCheats / TheDanishefskyDeception ! Leak of the Day:
MSKCC BirdBrain of the Day: Ed Mahoney, VP MSKCC Facilities (mis??)Management on behalf of MSKCC's Facilities Team that builds a laboratory strewn with toxins and knowingly fails to install ductwork controls, whose fume hoods cross contaminate, ... whose facilities have been cited by OSHA and the EPA ... http://www.osha.gov/pls/imis/establishment.inspection_detail?id=307012641 ...
The !MSKCCheats / TheDanishefskyDeception! Leak of the Day!:
This one's pretty good. So the Gyn department of MSKCC gets a write up in a lay press magazine (likely New York Magazine) and drops the ball. They not only get the facts wrong, but treat the Bioorganic Lab as though they are mere technicians as opposed to the brains behind the operation. That's BAD, as in Ghost Busters Crossing the Beams Bad. So the Oracle upon review of the article senses a ripple in the force, that something is amiss and interacts with the head scientist of this project (in this case a Columbia grad student, abd, then housed at MSKCC while completing work on his Columbia thesis). WHAT? is Hyuinjin's comment of disbelief when reading the piece. So the Oracle writes up from his perspective problems with the article (invoking Ike's ... a one paragrapher) ... has the point man on the project and the head Lab Tech review and edit it and then reports the, um, ovesight by our esteemed colleagues. Concurrently he runs the faux pas by his contact (the writer in MSKCC's Propaganda Department) to find out what could have gone wrong. When there's a quiver in the writer's (Rosie the Writer) voice the Oracle senses something really went amiss. The Oracle is told that so and so (the 'Media Coordinator' [in this case the Media F*ck-Up] was in charge of this write up ... and so after numerous attempts to reach this 'professional' in MSKCC's Propaganda Department's Office, the sum of reconnoitered information is passed on to the fearless leader of the Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory, aka, Sam the Wise [but as seen vide supra, not always ethical] One. ... Jabba the Hutt was pi**ed off! When told that muckety muck Media Coordinator was pulling an Ostrich (burying her head in the sand) Sam tells the Oracle to 'deal directly with Avice' [Avice is the erstwhile VP of Public Affairs of MSKCC, an incumbent Propagandist with the HHMI (and ooooooooooooh shhhhhhhhhh somewhat sapphic according to Sara Frei*, too, erstwhile of the MSKCC Propaganda Department). So the Oracle repeatedly tries to get through to the Media Coordinator to no avail and so wrote up a summary of the lab's concerns, ran it by both the graduate student on the project AND the incumbent Lab Manager (the Post Doc with the added administrative burden of running the lab from a postdoc perspective [likely !Ken the Great!] ... is this note rude? no. is there anything inappropriate? no. ... then off to Avice it is! The next morning the Oracle gets a call ... whose identity is revealed on the phone's digital readout. it's the 'Executive Assistant' to the VPPropagandist ... Oh hi ... cut off ... very official tone of voice: Mr. Oracle? This is the office of Vice President Avice Meehan ... (OH Boy, what now ?!?). Please hold for Vice President Meehan ... Mr. Oracle. I want to let you know that I am in receipt of the letter you sent to me. We are going to do three things: (1) we are going to pretend you never thought of writing this note; (2) we are going to pretend you never typed this note; (3) we are going to pretend you never sent this note. I am going to return this note to you. Please let Dr. Danishefsky know that if he wants to speak with me about this matter that he should deal directly with me. Is that clear Mr. Oracle? ... Gee whiz, the Oracle retorts: 'did you find this note offensive'? The Propagandist/Parrot retorts: ABSOLUTELY. Oy. So 5 minutes later the note is on the Oracle's chair ... The Oracle speaks with the grad student AND the Lab Manager Post Doc ... but is assured that there's nothing impolite or inappropriate in the letter. Sammy baby calls later in the day and asks for an update and asks amongst other things if the Oracle dealt with Avice ... Sam, Avice was upset with the way it was dealt with. Sammy baby states, 'don't worry about it, i'll deal with Avice what about the grants [editorial/graphic/administrative coordination]?' ... so the note is left on Sammy the Wise's desk ... upon Sam's return (likely dripping ice cream from his chin) ... [Sammy slobber!] ... the Oracle and Sam, The Brilliant Man go over Editorial projects du jours and apparently [if Avice the Sapphic One were to have her way] de jure ... Sam repeats that he'll take care of it, not to worry. So the Oracle reiterates that Avice was indeed upset and that he ought to look over the letter. So he says he'll look it over and the Oracle discretely steps out of the room to the antechamber ... 3 minutes later, WHAT proclaims Sam. Oy thinks the Oracle ... Oracle, come in here ... Oy, curtains for the Oracle? THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH THIS LETTER. Well, Sam, Avice was quite upset ... DON'T WORRY ABOUT AVICE, I'LL TAKE CARE OF HER AND COVER FOR YOU now waddabowt the grants?... To bad he didn't cover for the Oracle when the weasels in the Facilities Management Department tried to poison chronically workers in RRL and then tried to cover it up. Munch, munch, munch ...
To: Faculty and Board Members
James Colgrove, Robert Klitzman, Arthur Kuflik, Kristina Orfali,
Columbia University, MS in Bioethics Program;
Courtney Canfield, Aleksandra Chancy, Jaime Daniels, Mike Debiak, Richard E. Gavin, Louis C. Grassi, William Hart, Timothy F. Hegarty, Mysore Nagaraja, Reza Nikain, John Rusk, Joseph (Joe) M. Schwed, John Taylor, Liem Tran, Bob Yardis, Lauren Yarmuth, Michael S. Zetlin, Columbia University, MS in Construction Administration
cc: Presidents Thompson (MSKCC), Bollinger (CU), Tessier-Lavigne (RU)
re: Suggested MS in Bioethics Student, Dr. Sarah Danishefsky
Suggested MS in Construction Administration Student, Ed Mahoney, VP Facilities Management, MSKCC
We’d like to recommend Dr. Sarah Danishefsky and Mr. Ed Mahoney as prospective, eminently qualified and perhaps ideal candidates for admission to Columbia’s respective fledgling MS in Bioethics and Construction Administration Degree Program. Sarah Administers a high profile and prolific albeit intermittently, palpably disingenuous [in variance with its usually high caliber scientific work product] laboratory at MSKCC. Ed Mahoney is MSKCC's VP, Facilities Management. “Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer]; The mission of Sloan Kettering / MSKCC is nonpareil. There are instances of brilliance, selflessness, as well as egregiously unnecessary and inappropriate craven self servitude, shameless self promotion, a completely unnecessary and inappropriate intermittently palpable disingenuousness (whose transgressors ought to be ashamed of themselves considering that they clearly know better), conflicted interests, invocation of the follow the money syndrome, a bizarre confluence of facilities management shortcomings (see OSHA, EPA) that could impeach the credibility of reaction conditions and thus scientific results, curious navigation of the who works for whom (Public Affairs or Facilities for SKI/MSKCC, or its converse) conundrum, a ruse invoked to promote a much needed and ballyhooed replacement research building, thinly veiled attempts to sweep the above (and other curious anomalies) under the rug (by puppets from the Research Resources Management and/or MSK Facilities Management divisions) as well as people who (though they know better) by their actions would steal hope in variance with MSKCC’s mission of steeling hope. Why would a non-clinician attempt to influence enrollment in a clinical trial of a competitor by embargoing information relative to its availability to oft desperate cancer patients (or their proxies)? Why would a non-clinician attempt to leverage a clinician to continue enrollment in a clinical trial in variance with the clinician’s better judgment (might very large milestone royalty payments influence this tack)? Why would MSKCC Facilities build a laboratory building and knowingly not install ductwork controls, install faulty fume evacuation hoods and possibly purified water conduits that can compromise reaction conditions and concomitantly patient safety? Why would an employee ‘deal’ prescription drugs in MSKCC’s basement (its General Stores takes up a large part of the basement, so one must consider how much of the General Stores were compromised and if patients safety was jeopardized); Why would an employee graft over 1 million $ in toner cartridge? For invocation of the Danishefsky Deception [they are green (haute connoisseurs of mucophagy and rhinotillexamania), but at times do not access a moral compass and exhibit some of the most disingenuous behavior [framed and contrasted by a curious amount of bible thumping] witnessed by the author of this essay], we recommend the establishment of the Danishefsky Chair in Bioethics, a toilet seat emblazoned in gold lettering with the citation ‘you’re supposed to care’. In recognition of MSKCC’s bizarre infrastructure shortcomings, we recommend that henceforth its Facilities Management team (Ed Mahoney is its incumbent VP) wear Clown Costumes as a standard issue uniform. MSKCC, we hoped you’d be our hero; MSKCC, minimally, you’re supposed to care. Shame on you MSKCC, you know better. MSKCC, you ought to provide leadership by example, don’t be a weasel. Hopefully, with Professor Thompson’s fledgling tenure as MSKCC’s President will come nulling of its conjuring, synchronizing and squirming invocation of cover stories and adherence to its moral compass(es). Please see http://mskccethicsandsafetyconcerns.wordpress.com and/or http://www.concerns-at-sloankettering.blogspot.com for a summary of these and related concerns.
follow up to the above: documentation supporting Mr. Mahoney's candidacy:
http://www.osha.gov/pls/imis/establishment.inspection_detail?id=307012641
lovely.
... this one's pretty good ... in the mating / a** kissing game of high end science, Jules' boy (as Garrison Keillor would say, an obviously 'well above average fellow) had a first choice of college of Columbia University ... SJD invokes his super powers but as one might imagine admissions deals with anecdotal 'he's a nice guy' prompts from high profile professors about progeny of friends ... whom the high profile professor can't in good conscious give a real recommendation (when the mellifluous letter is 'decoded' ... or actually read between the lines) ... alas, well above average Boy of Jules' (as opposed to Professor David Berkowitz, aka Son of Sam
... doesn't make the cut at Columbia but, as you might imagine, muddles through, thank you very much by getting in to and enrolling at The University of Chicago. While there and possibly double majoring in something pragmatic and something that will get him better dates (e.g. french literature, if you know what i mean?) [anecdotoidal warning: it's been a while, so this may not be accurate, about the french lit and/or double major that is ... 
] ... and instead of a regular work study position, the young and industrious lad rode the wave of internet 'consultant' back in the day (early to late 90's when one who knew html could actually divvy up a template and charge either 3K or 10K for not for profit or for profit organizations respectively, flying worldwide (in his spare time [didn't U. Chi. give them homework? What about the closing of the American Mind academic Mafia in the Eco. dept.? Mr. Bloom? what say you? ...) ... setting up websites, but not (or rarely deigning to) do a not for profit site as 10:3 is an obvious impetus ... then the dot coms bomb in March Y2K (vide supra, Ariad tale, etc. ...) ... and the 10K gigs begin drying up. Boy of Jules' experiences (not hardship), but a rare bout of inconvenience for the first time in a loooong time. So back to the Courtship Dance ... Jules comes to NY and arranges to bring his boy to meet the Danishefskys over one of the post lecture suppers Sarah is so famous for disingenuously placing only the right (politically beneficial to the D's) people at the table. ... no Daughter of Dr. Fox (benefactor of one of the first Bioorganic focused named lectures at MSKCC during the Danishefsky administration), but YES Boy of Jules. Flashback: SJD is at times a luddite and staved off using (in variance with counsel of and even pleas by Editorial / Graphic [and other colleagues] ... computer generated powepoint presentations until embarrassed at a lecture ... multiple emulations and an OSX to OS9.whatever 'classic' ... smoke and mirrors interpolation coupled with last minute no time to QA slides did SJD in (while he wore sunglasses in a dark ACS lecture hall ...) and floating OH (or other groups) did it! ... and coupled with Sarah, the admin who counted the beans (and her stocks and exhibited curious instances of craven self servitude that would make even Ayn Rand wretch ...) too wouldn't deign to get SJD a lap top ... finally he was convinced that at any whistle-stop lecture (ACS, ice cream shop, NOBEL???) a host or his/her acolytes (grad student) would be honoured to run SJD the Great's computer driven powerpoint presentation! ... but back to Boy of Jules ... who'd exhibited a possible desire to go to Business or Law School but was floundering in the post dot com consultants reality check ... and began deigning to consider the non profit facet (remember 10 v. 3 K??) of his (lest the) gig (be up??). SJD colleagues had previously proposed doing up a web site, but Luddites Danishefsky were not receptive. Turns out Schreiber's staff branched off into such a field and actually concentrated on academically (and even chemistry) oriented sites. so wisdom dictated that if SJD was going to deign to allow such a site to be developed, that the Schreiber affiliate's (and possibly other) shop(s) be considered too. So at the Jules' (post lecture) Dinner (no whining as did Peter [i can't repeat my results (didn't stop the Teflon Dali Sames!) and boo hoo David Baltimore bested me [that was Peter's job!] as President of Cal Tech ...] ... Boy of Jules shows up and SJD's affiliates are bewildered with the swagger of the young lad. Alas, at least at that point in time, gifting Boy of Jules with the portfolio enhancing web development gig did not materialize ... perhaps in the interim it has. Epilogue: we don't know where Boy of Jules' wound up, but he's industrious enough to have muddled through thank you very much ... but at that point, it was an 'over my dead body' (and that was attempted to be arranged!) moment, but as evinced herein and a plethora of other sites ... one must beware of attempting to (wrongly toss someone under a bus ... because one may be gifted back with that very same bus ... many times over. GBTB: Giving Back The Bus ... a noble, if not Nobel endeavor!
... oops typo good conscience ... (grant me dispensation ... it was train of thought ... )
!This one's REALLY good! ... so the great and wonderful Dr. Bill Fair, M*A*S*H Doctor, eventually recruited and settled at MSKCC. Prostate cancer is the scourge of men gaining (pharmaceutically and medically inspired pr) ... [follow the money, but not the great prostate/psa rip off ...] ...desperate people tried to get in to see Dr. Fair who deferred to his team when he couldn't see people. ... Dr. Fair's outer office was thin, teamed by an admin, a nurse practitioner and a contingent (perma-temp) admin. One day the 'friends' from the 20th floor (then the home of the President, Paul Marks) calls up Dr. Fair's office and instructs the admin that Dr. Fair will see Mr. RobberBaronFella at such and such time ... the admin states we can't see him then (Dr. Fair was task saturated and over booked many times over such that he instructed his admin to under no circumstances book anyone else. ...) ... The Admin explains this to our 'friends' on 20 ... parquet floors notwithstanding ... yet the Marks office is persistent. Admin politely sticks to her guns and adheres to the admonition of her supervisor (Dr. Fair). Soon thereafter Dr. Fair is summoned (perhaps??) out of surgery for God's sake and instructed that he WILL see Mr. RobberBaronFella (whose namesake research laboratory building is chock full of foibles from both a facilities management [what me wurry?? no ductwork controls? who needz no stinkin' ductwork! ... and on and on ... and even (say it ain't so!) coi (conflict of interest) and even bioethics, um, zoot alors and fie ... anomalies! ... cough, cough, cough .. ] ... see Mr. RobberBaronFella (RBF) ... on the task saturated day. So the docket is laden with desperate possibly cancer strewn people and major donor Mr. RBF strolls in to see Dr. Fair at a time convenient to Mr. RBF ... it turns out that Mr. RBF got his jollies on and had a bout of 'prostate trauma' ... read: his paramour [ooooh, not the mrs??] avec accoutrement (snap on tools?) serviced Mr. RBF (pushy, pushy in the tushy, if you know what i mean) and poor, poor Mr. RBF is a bit inconvenienced as of late. Awwwwwwwwwwwwwww. and the SOBs on 20 (read: Dr. Marks) made the selfless Dr. Fair take time out from treating desperate and scared possibly cancer strewn people so Mr. had to get his jollies could get a look see under the hood post folly. no gerbils here, but Dr. Fair had to be politically correct when composing the report, subsequently typed by the contingent/temp admin. ... Mr. RobberBaronFella came in following a bout of prostate trauma ... WHAT? you ninny (@ RBF, not Fair!). So straight-arrow erstwhile M*A*S*H Doctor Fair asks his admin (suburban housewife who refers to her husband as an sob [the only reason i'm staying with the s**t is because of my daughter type arrangement] ...) ... and his nurse [the type who truly cares and who is truly competent, the type you want to be your nurse!] (the lovely practitioner, courting a husband ...) ... what really goes on 'out there' ... and they were perplexed ... with the pushy, pushy in the tushy phenomenon exhibited wink-wink, by Mr. Marjor Donor RBF and why the f*c* the selfless and tres vrais competent Dr. Fair had to take time out from seeing cancer stricken people(per admonition of the institute's president) to see this dork. flash forward ... Dr. Marks is in his twilight days as incumbency (president) as the as yet to arrive erstwhile student of his (the nobel laureate Dr. V!) has not yet assumed his throne (or perhaps he has ...) and the selfless (self and pi [principal investigator] driven post doc passes out on the first floor of the RobberBaronFella Research Labs ... (he had an ulcer ...) and DOCTOR Marks passes the fellow who turns to Carl (the erstwhile State Trooper who got tired of being shot at and joined sloan as a security officer [a good guy!] ...) and says, Carl, do me a favor and take care of this ... QED ... priorities, priorities, priorities ... hats off to Dr. Marks, erstwhile President of MSKCC, another one of Sloan's thousand shining points of light! [time for a hot-bubble-mikvah! (to expunge the stench?)] ...
Avice Meehan
MSKCC
Department of Public Affairs
Via Inter Office Mail
Dear Ms. Meehan,
Stacey Harris notified me that our query relative to the piece entitled "Preventing the Second Strike" by Nancy Wartik in New York Magazine (forwarded by our friends in PA) was passed to Ms. Westerman. However, Dr. Dansiehfsky asked me to follow up directly with you. We are concerned as to whether any consideration was given to mentioning the PI/lab (Samuel Danishefsky/Bioorganic Chemistry) that synthesized the vaccine and more importantly (the reason for the follow up note), of having us review it for accuracy. As discussed, we noted a misstatement of the facts in paragraph 2, lines 6 and 7. Lewis Y antigen is a carbohydrate, not a protein. This is in variance with what was erroneously printed.
The reason for our concern is as follows. KLH, to which the antigen Lewis Y is tagged, is utilized as a carrier protein in order to stimulate the immune system. However, KLH is not what would theoretically make the vaccine in question work. KLH acts as a vehicle for transferring the information, though it is the information (the Lewis Y antigen, a carbohydrate) that is important. KLH, though necessary in the current vaccine iteration, may be thought of as a mindless drone, incapable of (or unlikely to perform) actions that are not scripted (think of bean curd). A current goal is to synthesize vaccine conjugates of antigens with molecules many orders of magnitude smaller than that of KLH, that will perform the same immunostimulatory function as does KLH, possibly obviating the need for such a cumbersome attachment. As may be apparent, simplicity and hence stealth are admirable goals in the vaccine's architecture and mode of action.
Even if one were to accept the premise that crediting the lab that devised the vaccine was unwarranted, the unnecessary misstatement should have been avoided. Someone who knows of Le Y antigen might come the conclusion that the clinician interveiwed does not have a good handle on what he is talking about. Furthermore, MKSCC's lay friends in high places may be embarrassed were they to propagate the misnomer relative to the vaccine's architecture. This would all reflect negatively on our shop.
I am charged with he administrative oversight of editorial materials that emanate from, or are about the Bioorganic Laboratory or its work. I interact with our colleagues in Public Affairs as well as our laboratory and clinician colleagues on a regular basis for this purpose. Strict policing of all lay press Bioorganic Chemistry receives is necessary to ensure that no misrepresentation, misstatement of facts or myopia be allowed to occur in our name, or about our projects. Coupled with the circumspect and cautious optimism that accompany our vaccine projects is the hope that no errors be made that reflect poorly upon us, especially those invoked by others. Here, we have a case where all of the above could have been avoided. In the future, please afford Dr. Danishefsky and the Bioorganic Chemistry Lab the courtesy of reviewing pieces relative to our work for accuracy of content. I enclose a few papers on the vaccine/ KLH subject for perusal.
Sincerely yours,
Editorial and Graphics Specialist
Bioorganic Chemistry
Avice Meehan is the erstwhile VP of Propaganda [redacted] Public Affairs. She's apparently an incumbent at HHMI. Munch, munch, munch, slurp, slurp, slurp, yum, yum good! Lovely!
... hey, is Ms. Westerman aka Chris Hickey, the 'director of communications' at mskcc who according to Sara Frei* has a substance abuse problem in her family? tooting one's own horn or lines ... is there a coke (cocaine issue there)? [word on the street, not verified!] ... think about the symbolism here ... mind altering drugs ... propaganda ... public affairs ... go figure.
... (paraphrased) ... '... oh, we already know that ...' ... an hhmi professor upon receiving an email containing information discussing the intermittently palpable disingenuous that emanates from MSKCC and specifically the Danishefskys at Sloan ... oh well.
! The DanishefskyDeception / MSKCCheats ! Leak of the Day!: curious book keeping / accounting from the Danishefsky [bioorganic?/columbia?] Lab(s)! ... so Danishefsky travels (have slides, will travel [corollary of Kary Mullis' ' ... have slides, will stay home ...']) ... (and perhaps takes the lovely Mrs. ... so) he either submits expenses (including ticket reimbursement! wink, wink, wink ...) through multiple reimbursement sources ... (Columbia, MSKCC, [big pharma / biotech] scientific consultancy, academic/university departmental talk) if you know what i mean ... the admin charged with filing paperwork doesn't feel right doing as charged and prepares paperwork for the PI himself to sign ... (i.e., defacto) attempts to recuse themself ... when such 'discomfiture' gets back to Sarah Danishefsky, Administrative Manager, Bioorganic Chemistry Lab, she has an epiphany, and actually takes time out from the no-show part of her no-show job [elaboration on another post, if you please!] ... and actually comes to her ['how am i going to check my stocks'?] full time (the new math ... remember there are not for profit, for profit and now 'not for profit my a**' designations!) job!!! at MSKCC ... and there is a curious and interestingly timed, um, record cleaning soon thereafter!!!! by Sarah. Hmmm... wonder what may have been expunged?!? ... does Mr. John Gunn, Executive VP, MSKCC know about this? ... unsubstantiated ... especially when records are tossed if you know what i mean! ... then there is the time when PI (principal investigator) has slides will travel, sans wife (venue does not have a big enough draw/cache for the mrs.!) i mean Administrative Manager ... and PI submits his same ticket for reimbursement multiple times to different biotech's [or biotech/academic venues] he back to back consults [or gives departmental symposia] at (flashback: according to 'he's a birdbrain' [per above mentioned brilliant man/pi] bill bornmann above mentioned pi had been banned from one very big pharmaceutical company from consulting because of a curious anomaly ... coincidental of course! ... project selection [by pi] that pharmaceutical company claims was previously discussed [prior art!] at bigpharma consultancy ...hey, don't they sign confidentiality agreements? he said /she said / he said / she said ... and so on and so forth ... one of pi's academic progeny has since paved the way to attempt to assuage his then employer and grease the path for the return of SammyBaby [de-ban!]) ...) ... he back to back consults at either multiple biotechs or academic and biotech/big pharma joints and submits ticket more than once for reimbursement (oy here we go again!
... admin is charged with submitting paperwork and told by pi ... 'my time is very important' ... one for me, one for you ... two for me ... all for me. ... lovely ... the new math ... MSKCC, the best cancer care anywhere (as long as consistent with their revenue stream ...) ... boo, you know better Drs. Danishefsky ... same to you MSKCC ... you ARE supposed to provide leadership by example ... remember the closing seen from And Jutice For All? ... if he's right, she's lying ... but she doesn't have a motive ... the reason she doesn't have a motive is because SHE'S NOT LYING ... my client is guilty as sh*t ... and i'm going to get him ... you're going straight to H*ll ... [the don't you care scene is pretty dart tootin' good, too!] QED.
! TheDanishefskyDeception / MSKCCheats ! Leak Of The Day: Lie? Cheat? Pick your nose and eat it? Disingenuous? Stealing Hope, One Clinical Trial Enrollee At A Time ... Shame on you Drs. Danishefsky and MSKCC, You're SUPPOSED to care! You're SUPPOSED to provide leadership by example. BOO. You know better.
... oops ... it's the closing 'scene' [and justice for all reference above] ... typo! oops! ... but while you're on the line, let's give a big shout out to MSKCC BirdBrain(s) of the day, on behalf of a keystone cop-ish Facilities Team: Ira (you upset a lot of people when you mentioned OSHA) Lerner, Ed (VP!) Mahoney, and on behalf of a squirming Mr. John Gunn, Executive VP, MSKCC, the one, the only milquetoast Gus (sycophant/puppet) Bernhardt! .... and remember: this: http://www.osha.gov/pls/imis/establishment.inspection_detail?id=307012641 ... is just the tip of the iceberg!
... so Ed/Graph Spec meets with Shaun Smith, HR Administrator at MSKCC for 'informational interview' ... he's asked ... is there anything else you'd like to ask? ... and brings up the discomfiture relative to conflict of interest / ethics concerns in the bioorganic lab ... the tone of the meeting changes ... and is told that he should discuss those matters with 'employee relations' ... soon thereafter, Ed/Graph Spec meets with Neal Rosen on a matter related to research and brings this up as an aside ... Neal is an intermittent research colleague and friend of the bioorganic team ... ARE YOU CRAZY? ... DO YOU WANT TO GET YOURSELF KILLED? ... WHAT THEY'RE DOING IS [REPREHENSIBLE] ... BUT ACTUALLY NOT ILLEGAL ... HOWEVER SLOAN CAN LOOSE ITS LICENSE [to conduct clinical trials] ... [if word of this gets out ... therefore ... any mention of this will be denied ...] ... DO YOU WANT HAROLD [Varmus] ... TO HAVE YOU KILLED? ... think stuff like this doesn't go on? Think again. Neal has sat on the Scientific Adivsery Board of the Biotech who purchased Sloan's portfolio of epothilones ... a company who after the proverbial legal pi*sing contest [j'accuse! / he said / she said ...] ... BMS (Bristol Myers Squibb) and MSKCC took the hatchets out of each other's backs relative to the IP intellectual property epothilone (ours are better than yours) ... wars when it seemed as neither were clearly [statistically??] 'better' than the other ... relative to patient efficacy ... purchased the Biotech (Kosan) and all became honkey dorey ... Sausville who sat on that same board curiously found new employment (moved from the NIH to Maryland!!) when a new director came in and (cleaned house??) curiously at the time that COIs relative to epothilone were coming to light ... don't forget to follow the money!!! BTW, though Bill is capable of being nefarious and a jerk at times, he had a right to be a little paranoid at Sloan as he was not treated well ... the author of this missive however doesn't necessarily agree with the nosepicker/gobble gobble green [or, have we mentioned yet, ear wax! oy, oy, weird, but true!] eater ... about Bill's Brain.
http://mskccethicsandsafetyconcerns.wordpress.com/
perhaps the disingenuous duo of Drs. Sam and Sarah Danishefsky might (invoking Ricky Riccardo!) start 'splainin' where on earth in that bible (and other ancillary) tomes they're apt to thump it grants them dispensation to act in the selfish manner with which they have ... when there is no need to.
perhaps Ed (invoking the Great Gazoo!) Dumb-Dumb [on behalf of MSKCC's Facilities (MIS)Management Team(s)] Mahoney might account for the folly that is Sloan's Facilities' infrastructure.
... and that goes for the milquetoast(s) Gus Bernhardt, Executive Vice President John Gunn, Jim Quirk and on and on and on.
you are, not the light of, but the laughing stock of the world.
Some more what-me-worry from MSKCC Facilities:
A.Gifford Miller
Kenneth M. Moltner
C. Virginia Fields
Joseph B. Rose
Dear Sir or Madam,
Employees of Sloan-Kettering have been asked to lobby "as (we) see fit" on behalf of Sloan's admittedly contentious rezoning and research building initiatives for presentation to various community leaders, government agencies, and at community meetings and hearings. I am happy to submit my comments as suggested by Sloan to the named recipients of this letter.
I have worked at MSKCC for approximately 10 years and have not missed one day of work. My parent's first child died of childhood leukemia at Memorial Hospital two years before I was born. A child with this affliction today stands a good chance of survival due in no small part to the therapeutic advances fomented at Sloan and other like-minded Institutions. Since 1993 I
have worked as an Editorial and Graphics Specialist in the prolific Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory. With few notable exceptions I am used to working with extremely high caliber, intelligent, hard working and dedicated people. From my vantage point I see daily the benefits of so-called 'translational research,' and the benefits of having researchers in close proximity to clinicians. I feel that the selflessness of the SKI researchers, coupled with their prolific work product, warrants expansion and decompression to this much needed new research building with the following caveat: proceed with caution.
I feel it appropriate to point out that systemic shortcomings in the Facilities Management and the infrastructure of MSKCC's Rockefeller Research Laboratory (RRL, 430 E. 67th Street) have allowed for Sloan's employees (and by extrapolation, the surrounding Community) to be exposed to acutely dangerous as well as to chronically negligent environmental health and safety conditions. Below, I will outline but three examples. The surrounding Community may wish to factor these issues into the equation as it considers building and expansion privileges for Sloan.
Systemic Ductwork faults in the building had not been addressed until ... more than ten years after the building was supposedly completed, more than eight years after RRL 13, the floor I've worked on since 1993, was retrofitted). Prior to that [addressment], the ductwork in RRL never worked properly. Sloan and its Facilities Management knew of this situation for years, yet addressed this issue coincidentally only after I challenged this negligence in writing (as part of a written challenge to he veracity of Sloan’s explanation of events preceding a building evacuation [see below]). Workers in RRL cannot open windows, are
dependent upon (and must trust) that Sloan provide an air duct system that works and were therefore unnecessarily exposed to
chemical and bio-hazards, for years.
Workers on RRL 13 have been chronically and intermittently exposed to airborne toxins/pathogens from an animal facility located on the floor below (RRL 12) because of sloppy work performed by contractors when the floor was retrofitted approximately 9 years prior, (a common drain was covered over, yet never sealed) as well as through a sink drain. Although Facilities had verbally denied the possibility of exposure to the airborne waste and exudates from the animal facility, this situation festered and was no longer deniable. It was eventually addressed more than eight years after the floor was retrofitted when the stench became intolerable.
At [one point] the Rockefeller Research Labs needed to be evacuated following a chemical spill on RRL 14 and perfusion of chlorine gas onto the 13th floor. MSKCC, in a Memo distributed to all employees via email from the head of safety (but possibly co-written, edited, approved, ghosted or issued via edict by an administrator, administrators or the Public Affairs office) neither of whom, unlike myself, was (or were) on site when this situation developed, dismissed the event. Sloan would have you believe that gas wafted through two closed doors in the emergency stairwell and through a third (the southern) laboratory door, jumped over open space in the south end of a lab (where it could not be smelled or otherwise sensed) and settled mid room in front of and below multiple, segregated and isolated hoods, ducts and drains. Sloan subsequently dismissed as 'impossible' the likelihood that the chlorine perfused through the air ducts and fume hoods even though Sloan admitted once again soon after the incident (via posted announcement that duct work controls would be replaced throughout the building) that the duct work in the building did not work properly. Following the evacuation an administrator from Facilities attempted to intimidate me ("warning" me that I "upset a lot of people") when I challenged the veracity of the MSKCC inaccurate assuagement. Though others may experience post-intimidation amnesia, I feel that unit integrity also equals unit safety.
The combination of "ductwork to nowhere" and "sewers to everywhere" was a particularly pernicious cocktail considering silica, cyanide, nitrogen and many other toxins and poisons are used on RRL 13 and that innumerable pathogens are present in the animal facility below. No one, myself included, wants any lab downtime.
In my opinion, the caliber of the science and the dedication of the vast majority of Sloan employees is off-scale and consistent (as is Sloan's mission) with the furtherance of the research-building project(s) and initiative. However, the MSK Facilities Management Department or those operating under its aegis does have a history of doing (or overseeing) sloppy work, allowing for (and indifference to) exposure of Sloan's employees to dangerous conditions, of not being on top of the infrastructure of the current RRL (research) building, of conjuring and synchronizing cover stories an of threatening employees in an attempt to cover up environmental-health related shortcomings. I have listed but three examples but could cite others. When considering the granting to Sloan the privilege of constructing a sky-scraping research tower, or granting carte blanche via rezoning, you may also consider that strict oversight of the building project(s) and other aspects related to the interface between Sloan and Community Health is also appropriate.
Build? Yes, of course, we must. But with proper controls and oversight as labs can be safe if they are kept safe by responsible people who must be held accountable to the employees and the community (through some kind of review board or ombudsman and less so to the MSKCC Facilities Management and their confederates). Those who answer Sloan’s siren call, “A Life’s Calling,” as posited in loan’s Human Resources want ads, should in the future be able to expect that known infrastructure shortcomings that effect environmental health issues be dealt with in a timely manner and that employees and the community not be treated as canaries in a mine shaft. In these trying times it is important to be circumspect. The suggestion of this dedicated employee of SKI is of course to move ahead, however cautiously.
I hope these thoughts are of interest to you and germane to the privilege granting process. I may be reached via the numbers listed below should you seek clarification or wish me to elaborate further on these matters.
Sincerely,
Editorial and Graphics Specialist
Sloan-Kettering Institute
! MSKCCheats / TheDanishefskyDeception ! ... disingenuous moment, leak of the day:
SJDanishefsky submits an 'important' paper to an important/high profile journal. 'Concurrent' with submission (supposedly at the same time, but actually after the paper was submitted) he copies it to the President of the fine institution that is his employer (at that point, incumbent), Harold Varmus. The cover letter copied to Varmus states that he's 'shown' the paper to Varmus, when in fact he copied it to him after it was submitted. This pissed Varmus off to no end, resulting in an email to SJD stating that it was 'disingenuous' in that it implied that Varmus approved of the paper. [not making a value judgment on the paper, but on the MO of the PI here]. SJD of course tried to blame the mix up on someone else! This really s*cks because the science is legit, but the MO is not quite kosher and is distasteful when it doesn't need to be.
“Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer]
Institutes and individuals capable of performing such high levels of research clearly know better than to act in so disingenuous and selfish a manner
Why would a non clinician instruct a colleague to withhold/embargo known information relative to availability of clinical trial candidates developed off site, yet tested at MSKCC (e.g. BMS’, Novartis’) when the in house (e.g. Bioorganic’s) candidate had not yet left the proverbial starting gate?
Why have there been reports of high profile non clinicians leveraging clinicians overseeing clinical trials to continue enrollment possibly in variance with the intuition of the clinician … when very large ‘milestone’ (e.g. completion of a clinical trial phase) achievement royalty payments are in the balance?
Why would Sloan abandon a building after its employees are chronically exposed to poison (carbon monoxide) after terminating on pretense employees who complained about heath concerns?
Why would Sloan build a laboratory building strewn with toxins and knowingly not install ductwork controls?
MSKCC has been cited for ’serious’ environmental health and safety infractions by OSHA
MSKCC has been cited by the EPA
Ed Mahoney VP currently heads MSKCC Facilities Management
Sarah Danishefsky Ph.D. (a non clinician) has administered the bioorganic chemistry laboratory
Attorney Shelly Friedman has represented MSKCC when it attempts to assuage a rightfully concerned local community (and its CB8M board) relative to environmental health and safety (EH&S) concerns
Christine Hickey has in the past been a spokesperson for MSKCC
MSKCC, we hoped you’d be our hero.
MSKCC, minimally you’re supposed to care.
Shame on you MSKCC
Boo.
You know better.
How dare you, MSKCC
The best cancer care anywhere? ... as long as its consistent with the revenue stream of MSKCC, and certain clinician(s) and powerful non-clinicians at MSKCC.
compassionate care? oh yeah!
More What - Me - Worry Follies from MSKCC Facilities MisManagement
You should have seen the clowns from MSKCC Facilities lining the lobby or the RRL (Rockefeller Research Laboratories) at parade rest (for once absent a smirk) acting 'official' as though they are on top of the safety / infrastructure of the building when MSKCC employees were allowed to return to RRL after the 'all clear' was sounded by the FDNY ...
To: John Kelly, MSKCC Lab Operations Paul Zel, MSKCC Safety
From: Bioorganic Chemistry
RE: ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH AND SAFETY ANNOUNCEMENT
I was stunned when I read the egregious misstatements of the facts relative to what occurred yesterday in the Safety Memo mass distributed to "Everybody" at MSKCC via email in a note signed by Paul Zel. The statement contains numerous misstatements of the facts. The laboratory workers on RRL 13 were affected by the gas, which was disseminating through the RRL duct system. In addition, workers from the Safety Department did not want to enter the 14th floor without gas masks because of a reported gas cloud, yet they either allowed or instructed Plant Op workers to enter the floor. At least 3 of the Plant Op workers were exposed to the chemical cloud. The incident was not localized on the 14th floor and it did spread "appreciably" to the 13th floor. The evacuation on RRL 13 became "appropriate" and was a response to a dangerous situation. It was not "precautionary" since the laboratory personnel were reacting to the chemical [trouble breathing, eye reactions — note that the chemists are especially circumspect as to raising an alarm] and the Safety workers did not want to enter the 14th Floor without gas masks (which they didn't have)— evincing a situation that was not under control. Not only were building occupants in imminent danger, but I reported (in triplicate via phone to Security, Lab Ops and Safety before anyone arrived on scene) that laboratory personnel were exposed to fumes and were reacting to them. Two of our workers did not return to work because of nausea. Although the MSKCC workers were evacuated, and were asked to vacate a large portion of the south side of 67th Street, no official from MSKCC notified the School adjacent to RRL even though children were playing in the schoolyard. A Ph.D. Research employee on RRL 13 who has two children that attend that school, performed that task. I'm truly in a state of disbelief that
such a memo was distributed. Clearly, there is a need to be circumspect and not over react to a situation. However, belittling a dangerous situation as has been done in the email memo is merely a performance of revisionist history. I'm astonished to see that Safety has so little respect for the workers in RRL. Enclosed, please find a summation of events as best I recall them relative to the incident in RRL. Some time in the morning (likely between 10:00 and 10:30 AM -- I'm not sure of exact the time), I noticed an alarm sounding. I did not recall ever hearing this particular alarm squeal during my tenure on RRL 13 (7 years). It seemed to be coming from the floor above RRL 13, but admittedly, it could have been coming from anywhere in the building as sound travels deceptively through the elevator shafts. The alarm continued to sound for an estimated 5-10 minutes. - I checked the floor and when I entered the Lab along the Eastern side of RRL 13 (RRL 1327) three of the research chemists were concerned about the presence of and were reacting to either “bromine or chlorine”. They stated that to the best of their knowledge, the problem was not emanating from the lab. - I attempted to call the security kiosk on RRL 1 (X2499), but couldn't get through -- the line was busy. I called the main security office. They didn't seem to know about the alarm. I apprised them that an alarm had been sounded, that it may have been coming from the floor above us and that there may be a chemical spill involved. I attempted to make it clear that the incident needed to be investigated right away. - I then called Lab Ops and reported this to the receptionist. - I then called Safety and was apprised that Safety was already on the way to investigate. - Before Safety arrived, I interacted with another Research Chemist who was reacting (teary eyes, chest problems) to the chemical fumes. - I then met a worker from Plant Ops in the South-East staircase of RRL 13 who was going to the floor above RRL 13. I asked him if he was responding to the alarm and he replied "yes." I asked him if he understood that there may have been a chemical spill involved -- (I reported that the chemists were concerned that there was a problem with a chemical ("chlorine or bromine") spill -- and emphasized that the chemists are usually quite circumspect and thick skinned relative to these concerns -- the point of emphasis is that if the chemists are truly concerned, there may be a very bad problem). The Plant Ops worker stated that he was just instructed to check out the alarm and continued up the stairs - The Safety People arrived. I was asked if I called the Fire Dept. [There was an accusatory tone in the Safety Employee’s voice, implying that he was more concerned that the FDNY NOT be notified than in employee safety] and I respond "no." They are apprised (by the worker who is upstairs?) that there is either smoke/fumes/gas on the floor above us. I overheard part of their discussion — They stated to each other that they didn't want to go up stairs without gas masks.* - When I realized that Safety did not want to go upstairs without gas masks (which they didn't have) and that there may have been a gas cloud upstairs [which evinced a lack of control of the situation], I opted to evacuate the floor and went from room to room, asking everyone to leave immediately. ** - Oddly, workers from Plant Ops waiting for permission from Safety to go upstairs were milling about by the RRL 13 stairway feigning maladies (holding throats, collapsing, playing dead) in a cavalier display of bravado. Later, I saw at least two of these workers being treated by EMS personnel, with oxygen. - I rode the elevator down with the Elevator Supervisor and, I believe, one of the Safety people and exited the building as the Fire Department arrived. - The Fire Department had the building evacuated. - While outside, I met our administrative manager (Sarah Danishefsky [who was coming to work ca. 10:30 or 11 AM!!]), and I apprised her of what had happened, as best I could. - Discussions with EMS, Fire and MSKCC personnel seemed to reveal that someone was cleaning the air ducts (so as to ensure that the water/air conditioning system doesn't have bacterial growth?) and mixed chemicals that are not supposed to be mixed and chlorine (?) gas was formed. The vapor in the cloud may have set off the alarm. - The first worker I'd met from Plant Ops (for whom I'd issued the caveat about the possible gas leak) was eventually taken to the hospital with an oxygen mask and a wrap around his head, possibly indicative of gas exposure to the lungs and a chemical burn on the head. I overheard that at least 7 people were taken to the ER. - Although the incident was not due to an accident in one of the organic chemistry labs, the presence of gas masks on our floor may have prevented worker exposure to whatever had leaked/formed on the floor above us. Although, a whole cottage industry / bureaucracy might spring up relative to the storage of gas masks on RRL 13 (eg: expense, purchase, training, maintenance), it may prove beneficial in the future. In summation, I feel that it is imperative that the record be set straight on my behalf and on behalf of RRL 13. I feel that the dismissive memo distributed contained incorrect information and that it does a disservice to myself and to co-workers whom [as a C14 Chemistry Laboratory Certificate of Fitness holder (a certification I earned, per the request of MSKCC)] I feel responsible for. Although we don't know how this effected the rest of the building, RRL - 13 was indeed "appreciably affected."
*[In the past, we (on RRL 13) had lobbied for the placement of gas masks up here (RRL 13), but Safety and / or Lab Ops, based upon the premise of wanting us evacuated if there is a gas leak, declined this request. On the day of the incident, if masks were stored on RRL 13, emergency workers responding to the problem would not have either had to go back down stairs to get gas masks -- a waste of precious time -- or worked around the gas without protection].
** Over the years it has been reported that ductwork on RRL was not completed properly (ducts to nowhere?) when the floor was refurbished ca. ~ 8 years ago. The possible presence of dubious ductwork on RRL 13 further aided in my decision to have the floor evacuated.
From: Laboratory for Bioorganic Chemistry
To: MSKCC Human Resources, Employee Relations, Manager, Employee Relations, prunol@mskcc.org
RE:
(a) Sloan Policy re COI/clinical trials;
(b) Time and Effort reporting
For my own protection, I request that Sloan clarify its policies relative to the following COI/ethics and Time and Effort issues:
(a) On occasion an intuitive (and persistent cancer) patient (or their proxy) accesses the Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory via phone, seeking information about (and participation in) epothilone clinical trials conducted at MSKCC. In the past Sarah Danishefsky, Ph.D. (Administrative Manager, Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory) has instructed me to keep secret (withhold/embargo) known information relative to the availability of clinical trials conducted at MSKCC on a (Bristol Myers Squibb [and /or possibly Novartis’ - developed epothilone derivative) drug candidate(s) that compete(s) directly with an epothilone analogue candidate that emanates from the Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory, in variance with above-mentioned queries and the fact that Sarah Danishefsky is not a clinician (and stands to gain financially by instructing her (junior, but not direct-report) colleague to embargo such information). At that point in time Sarah Danishefsky had actually apprised me that a clinical trial on the competitor's drug candidate(s) was or were commencing (or had commenced) at Sloan and then instructed me to embargo this information. The AM (a non-clinician) subsequently attempted to cloak her motives by invoking early, unverified comparative in vitro data points. At that point in time the Bioorganic's candidate was — an estimated 1 year from the start of a proposed and hoped for clinical trial (which has apparently since begun [off site, and possibly at Sloan]). Germane is a financially significant, recent development / rights purchase of a Bioorganic Laboratory epothilone drug candidate by Roche via Kosan (its licensee). Although I can understand the premise of not promoting a competitor's product, that business tenet would clearly not be applicable in this situation at Sloan. As I've felt uncomfortable misleading (seemingly desperate cancer) patients, I have always referred such queries to either the MSKCC Physician Referral help line or to administrators or nurse clinicians affiliated with Dr. Sprigg's office (a clinician, under whose aegis the BMS [and / or possibly the Novartis] trial (and possibly, now, the Bioorganic candidate's study) is apparently conducted at Sloan) for proper vetting. That the Administrative Manager would place her own potential financial successes and results above the content of the character of the Sloan-Kettering Institute does not surprise me. That she instructed (and expected me) to abet this initiative was out of line and evidence of a lack of respect for the Institute and for myself. Although I consider the Administrative Manager to be Machiavellian, I did not think that she'd go so low as to expect me to do her dirty work or to drop her guard to the point that she'd expose herself, the lab and Sloan to this type of ethics liability, considering that the Bioorganic Compounds might very well (and will hopefully) prove to be the best of the epothilone class, after proper clinical trial vetting. Such a tack, if followed would be in variance with that espoused by the “Titans of Cancer” [Varmus, Nurse, Mendelsohn and/or Abeloff] on a recently aired television special. My parents' first child died of complications from childhood leukemia at Memorial Hospital two years before I was born. A child with this affliction today stands a good chance of survival due in no small part to the therapeutic advances fomented at Sloan and other like-minded Institutions. Sloan's mission is nonpareil and I do realize the need to be circumspect. Yet, if my Grandmother were alive and knew that the Administrative Manager placed her own potential profit ahead of proper clinical vetting of a drug candidate, Grandma (knowing what my parents went through during her grandson's demise and eventual death at Memorial) would write the Sloan Board and suggest that the Administrative Manager receive “a lickin'” [such as washing her mouth out with soap], and volunteer (and lobby) to carry out that task herself. A US Army General (possibly a War-College dean/affiliate) recently stated (I paraphrase) that Harvard MBA candidates learn to overcome ethics while pursuing a profit. Such an MO may be in variance with the COI and ethics policies of MSKCC. I have in the past presented this concern indirectly to Sloan, firstly in a comments-type section of an anonymous MSKCC Employee survey and under separate cover, by seeking counsel as to how to properly address this concern while meeting with Shaun Smith of MSKCC HR during an informational interview.
(b) I am the 'time-keeper' for the Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory and process (in year's past the paper payroll forms and subsequently [currently] the web based electronic) time-and-effort bi-weekly pay period reports and have submitted such information since 1993. Sarah Danishefsky (Administrative Manager (AM), Bioorganic Chemistry, spouse of the PI, Samuel J. Danishefsky) is rarely, if ever, on the SKI campus more than 50% time during any given pay period (inclusive of lunch and other mid-day breaks for personal errands) [This may be verifiable through MSKCC parking receipt records, as the AM commutes via car and parks in the MSKCC garage]. Typically, Sarah Danishefsky is at Sloan — Monday through Thursdays from late morning (~11 AM or noon) through 4 or 5 PM (inclusive of lunch) [though on very rare occasion(s) she is at Sloan at 10AM (eg: when shuttling the PI)]. Sarah Danishefsky is rarely, if ever, at Sloan on Fridays. A few year's ago the web-based electronic time and effort reporting interface relative to the AM defaulted to "Full Time" status and I was verbally instructed to process Sarah as a "Full Time" employee by the PI (even though at that point in time the AM had apprised me that she was not a full time employee). Germane to this is that Sarah Danishefsky has in the past attempted to admonish me during my regular work hours (9-5, M-F), calling me at Sloan on the phone from her home, complaining because she could not figure out how to check the status of her stocks on the internet (I had previously counseled the PI re suggesting high-speed internet access for his home, the end goal of which was to better facilitate electronic communication of scientific related matters between the PI, his two laboratories [SKI, CU] and his home). On Fridays Sarah has often told me via phone from her home that she shops and cooks. More recently, the Administrative Manager has had the temerity to expect me to take time out from my SKI related tasks, calling on a Friday from her home (a day that the PI often expects me to work through the day without taking a lunch break because the PI "leaves early" (~ 4 PM, depending upon the season and the time the sun sets) and expected me to ferret out from the web, print out and fax to her at home a seating plan for a Broadway Theatre at which she wanted to purchase tickets for a play. To date (for what might be obvious reasons), because of the vagaries of the Administrative Manager's time and effort at Sloan I have rarely, if ever, deducted any time relative to the AM's absence(s) from SKI (sick, vacation, or other absence(s)) when submitting the bi-weekly electronic time and effort report for Bioorganic Chemistry [especially since on the extremely rare occasion(s) that I did deduct time via the electronic time and effort payroll report (solely following Sarah's verbal/phone report(s) from her home) I was treated with hostility by the Administrative Manager. (Such reporting would leave a de facto electronic- or paper- trail relative to Sarah's time and effort — and her 'full time job')].
For my own protection, in these times of heightened corporate, medical and pharmaceutical industry scrutiny and accountability, given that research conducted in the Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory is funded in part by government (eg: NIH RO1 and RAID) grants and philanthropic (eg. MSKCC Major Donor) sources and that MSKCC is apparently reviewed by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Hospital Organizations, I ask that Sloan 's policy be clarified relative to the matters discussed in this note. Specifically, I ask (1) that Sloan's policy be clarified re the ethics/conflict of interest awkwardness (i.e. the instruction by the A.M. [a non-clinician], for a junior (but not direct — report) colleague to withhold information as to the availability of clinical trials conducted at Sloan on (a) competitor's drug candidate(s)) discussed herein and (2) so as to remove the onus of responsibility for misstating/mis-reporting the facts relative to the Administrative Manager's time and effort, that I receive written instructions from an administrator at Sloan (other than the PI [it had been verbally reported to me from the MSKCC Payroll department that the change in the AM's time-and-effort status emanated from the Quirk/Bernhardt Office]) to process Sarah Danishefsky as a Full Time employee as she is rarely, if ever, on campus 50% time (or greater) during any given pay period].
I thank Sloan, in advance, for addressing, via its Employee Relations division of Human Resources, the matters discussed in this note, which I submit on the record at this point in time for my own protection.
Sincerely,
Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory,
Sloan-Kettering Institute
Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
NCI-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center
Another white wash at Sloan Kettering!! ... sweeping Sloan's errors under the rug while Sloan tosses its selfless employees under a bus. Sloan dispatched selfless employees who if they didn't answer Sloan's Siren Call could have easily worked elsewhere ... who had previously received walk on water type annual appraisals ... based on pretense when they began getting sick [and rightfully reported their maladies] due to MSKCC's Facilities Follies. Sloan eventually had to ABANDON the building in question because they were exposing its employees to CO (as in Carbon Monoxide). The same bird brains who oversaw that fiasco built the Rockefeller Research Laboratories (RRL) and knowingly didn't (what me worry??) install ductwork controls. Sloan needed a replacement research lab building because of the top to bottom infrastructure fiasco that is RRL [problems that stood and stand to impeach the credibility of reaction conditions and therefore impeach research that emanates from MSKCC]. it's time to gift back to Sloan the bus that they're apt to toss their selfless employees under ...
From the NYTimes:
http://www.nytimes.com/1995/06/14/nyregion/when-office-air-hazardous-east-side-building-employees-complain-over-fumes.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm
[you may be directed to the second page of the article, if so, click on the ‘single-page’ link for full article]
When Office Air Is Hazardous; At an East Side Building, Employees Complain Over Fumes
By CAREY GOLDBERG
Your mind clouds over. You feel your head, heavy, gently sinking onto your desk. Or a nauseating drumbeat bores into your skull, and your nostrils suddenly fill with the plastic odor of -- is it Band-Aids? Or, if you are one of the worst hit, an invisible hand grabs your lungs and the world goes black.
That is how employees describe the strange spells that sometimes strike them at an East Side office building used by Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. The air in the building, they say, is so bad that workers often step outside -- not to smoke, as many office workers do these days, but simply to breathe.
"I reached the point where if I'd gone back into that building my family would have had to bury me," said Geraldine Hopper, a former patient accounts manager who said she lost her job last year after refusing to go into the building, on her doctor's advice.
She is suing the landlord in one of two multimillion-dollar lawsuits filed against Schnurmacher Brothers, the owners of the seven-story white brick building at 410 East 62d Street. And they are among a growing number of cases across the country in recent years that have drawn attention to "sick building syndrome," an often mysterious collection of maladies related to indoor air pollution.
New York City "is like the red hot center of indoor air quality problems," said Jim Young, a spokesman for the New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health, a nonprofit advocacy group for workers. "It's the place where the most office buildings are concentrated in the smallest area."
Because of the suits, representatives for Schnurmacher Brothers refused to discuss the air in the building. Despite years of complaints by its workers, Sloan-Kettering long maintained that it could find no evidence to support employees' contentions that noxious fumes were causing breathing problems, headaches, nausea, lethargy, rashes and flulike symptoms.
But finally, last month, the hospital said new tests had found high levels of carbon monoxide. It announced that it would move the administrative offices and more than 700 workers out of the building, when it found a new location.
"We've conducted literally thousands of tests and a source of any particular problem has never been identified," Chris Westerman, a Sloan-Kettering spokeswoman, said. "Until the last three weeks we had no data to support that there were compounds or agents at elevated levels."
The hospital's decision, although welcomed by workers, also left some employees bitter that Sloan-Kettering had stayed in the building for 10 years despite employees' complaints. "It's like a time bomb," said Howard Borowick, the lawyer representing Ms. Hopper and another former employee, Bernadette Russo, who blames the building for her chronic lung disease and has also filed suit. Ms. Hopper has asked for $25 million and Ms. Russo $20 million.
"If someone were to tell you there's a time bomb in your building," Mr. Boowick said, "would you wait, or just evacuate it? Nobody has to be subjected to this kind of danger to their health."
The danger, however, was not always so clear. As in many similar cases, some employees were far more sensitive than others. Some areas of the building presented no problem, while others had to be evacuated several times. Changes in ventilation systems, including new air filters, were tried, but failed to solve the problem.
Repeated attempts to analyze the air to determine what was causing the discomfort failed to pinpoint anything. Experts said it was one of the most analyzed buildings they had ever seen.
The building's problems appeared to stem not from a single element but, as often happens, from a combination of factors, including bad air from the heavy traffic outside and ventilation problems inside.
"Often, you just can't pin these things down," said Dr. Frank Mitchell, a Federal Government expert on indoor air pollution who inspected the building for Sloan-Kettering. "There's exhaust from the nearby highway and streets, a bus-idling area half a block away, a garage on top of the building; and the ventilation system probably has not kept up with the buildings built around it and the changes inside."
"It's easy now to say, 'Why didn't you get out?' " Dr. Mitchell said. "But when the complaints first started, they were only in one area, as is typical of these buildings. So they go in, do tests, install new machines, new air fresheners, new filters, they say, 'We can solve it in this area,' and then it advances to another floor."
But for Ms. Hopper and Ms. Russo, Sloan-Kettering is the villain, the heartless employer that, despite its international reputation as a healer, kept people working in such an environment.
When she complained repeatedly, Ms. Hopper said, she was "put in a corner," ostracized by her colleagues and bosses. She said she was told: "We have no problem. It's your problem."
Ms. Westerman of Sloan-Kettering said that the cancer center had made modifications to the building's ventilation systems and asked the landlord for renovations, in vain, in response to the complaints. But, she said: "It was difficult without having some documentation of the problem. It's difficult to resolve something if you don't know what the source is."
Ms. Russo, who left Sloan-Kettering in 1989, said that as soon as she started working at the East 62d Street building in late 1987 she began to feel ill. "I started coughing," she said. "I couldn't breathe. I was nauseous. My eyes were swollen. I couldn't swallow. My lips were cracked. Fatigue. I ended up with a spot on my lung."
She has been sick ever since, she said.
When she heard last month about Ms. Hopper's suit, Ms. Russo called the lawyer, Mr. Borowick, and filed her own suit. Mr. Borowick said he has received many more calls from Sloan-Kettering employees.
Indoor air pollution costs American businesses tens of billions of dollars a year in health care and lost work, the Environmental Protection Agency estimated. The "sick building syndrome" has spread since the 1970's as builders turned to tighter construction to conserve energy. It now affects up to 30 percent of new and remodeled buildings worldwide, the World Health Organization has said.
As awareness of the problem has grown, so has the number of lawsuits, said Elissa Feldman, deputy director of the Federal Environmental Protection Agency's Indoor Air Division.
"Increasingly, with so many people housed in large office buildings, it's very rare to find somebody who hasn't heard about there being a problem, or hasn't experienced some discomfort during their work history," she said. "Even if it's on the level of, 'Yeah, I used to work in a building where everyone got really sleepy in the afternoon, or people got headaches by 2 P.M.' "
But despite the extent of the problem, Mr. Young said that workers in New York have little recourse if they think that they have indoor air pollution.
Workers can call the Department of Health complaints line in emergency cases, or appeal to the Federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which has set guidelines on indoor air pollution and performs inspections when called in. But Mr. Young complained, and city officials agreed, that the OSHA guidelines, which are meant for factories, are too lenient to guarantee worker safety. Recent Federal and state attempts to pass laws on indoor air safety have failed.
"No agency is taking responsibility for indoor air pollution," he said. "If you have a problem in New York City and you try to get someone to come in and help, you're basically banging your head against the wall."
At Sloan-Kettering, to talk openly about the air quality remains enough of a taboo that of a dozen current employees asked about the problem, only five would speak, and only one, a newly hired systems analyst who had not had a problem, would give her name.
Others described weeks of breathable air, particularly once the air-conditioners have been turned on, as they have been lately, followed by day after day of noxious fumes.
"You don't know when it's going to hit," one computer specialist said. "And even when it hits, you keep going until you say, 'Enough is enough,' and step out. Some people literally go home for the rest of the day. One pregnant woman says, 'Sniff, bye, I'm not taking a chance.' "
Although Sloan-Kettering is planning to move, employees said they had been told it might be months before new space is ready. Though Dr. Mitchell and others have assured them that carbon monoxide has no long-term effects, word of the suits by Ms. Russo and Ms. Hopper is not exactly reassuring.
Every time the fumes hit, the computer specialist said, "Everyone goes, 'Oh, no, it's back.' "
Photo: Some Sloan-Kettering employees think the air in this office building on East 62d Street in Manhattan is making them sick. (Edward Keating/The New York Times)
***
It's true that the raison d'etre of sloan is non pareil. but the place is unfortunately confronted with egregious conflicts of interest, disingenuousness, outright cynicism, all of which are completely unnecessary and hurt desperate cancer stricken patients and/or their families and loved ones. This is not a reason to give Sloan Carte Blanch when it comes to their screw ups.
For the finks at MSKCC, salient features of an acknowledgment of receipt: This response to your message confirms that it has been received at the Archbishop of Canterbury's office. We are grateful to you for writing.
This one's pretty good: so Professor Danishefsky has a colleague at Columbia who pretty much may be summed up in this manner: brilliant and pretty much hasn't harmed a fly and never gets p*ssed off at anything ... keeps a super duper sized jar of M&Ms in his office ... this Professor gets so p*ssed off at Professor Danishefsky ... that he instructs his grants contract coordinator to pour b*con grease into the M&Ms ...
re the Jason Altom altruistic suicide SJD was on the scientific adivsory board of Harvard's chemistry department when that surfaced. it was not the first suicide that Corey collected. Everyone covered for Corey ... after all a nobel laureate gets to vote for future winners! Danishefsky prophesied in his recommendation letter to academic institutions that Dali would eclipse his other stand out high tiered candidates (that either came before Dali or who hatched at the same time) ... in a funny way, he did ... but sort of in the wrong way, if you know what i mean? Dali's brilliant and (usually!;) a nice guy, but apparently a greek tragedy protagonist ... and ultimately responsible for the Sezen 'affair' ... oh yeah, it's best not to sleep with your graduate students ... at least until they graduate? oui, oui? p.s.: for the lovely Dr. Sarah Danishefsky, today is a day one ought to worry about 'how am i going to check my stocks!?!' ... and don't forget to fill out the 'full time job' time card ...
Given the high level of research conducted, the Danishefskys' intermittent distasteful tack is clearly unnecessary, inappropriately disingenuous and cravenly self serving. no need to cheat MSKCC, no need to cheat Drs. Danishefsky. After all, you are supposed to provide leadership by example. You know better.
On this solemn anniversary, the selflessness of many is framed and bolstered by the completely unnecessary shameless self-servitude of a few. That goes for Drs. Danishefsky AND MSKCC.
On this solemn anniversary, the selflessness of many is framed and bolstered by the completely unnecessary shameless self-servitude of a few. That goes for Drs. Danishefsky AND MSKCC.
MSKCCheats / TheDanishefskyDeception ! Leak of the Day: Funny bookkeeping in the Danishefsky Laboratory? Sarah Danishefsky who shows up at work perhaps 50% time (lunch included)! is elevated from '54% employee' (whatever that is!) to 'full time employee'. When questioned by the admin charged with electronic time card submission Sarah denies being a 'full time employee'. When questioned further, she assumes the electronic time keeping duties (she deigns to work!) No one is talking about this curious anomaly! The quarterly verification sheets come from research resources management to be signed by the PI (that would be Professor Samuel J. Danishefsky!), yet he wants his admin to sign it on his behalf! Admin feels something isn't quite right (kosher!) and leaves form in signature file for SJD to address. Sarah Danishefsky after deigning to show face at Sloan has a fit as her spouse would by signing the form be misstating the facts (i.e. LYING!) about his wife's time and effort (does trading her own stocks from home, while the lab receives federal funding for not only RO1 discovery grants, but NIH RAID grants whose raison d'etre is to develop clinical trial candidates to the point of enticing either big pharma, or minimally biotech ... and then the lovely Dr. Sarah Danishefsky, non-clinician attempts to intercede (steer away!) desperate cancer patients or their proxies from clinical trial candidates as they compete with those that have YET to emanate from the lab her spouse PIs! After all when she calls from her home at 11 AM to complain that she 'can't check my stocks!' [wouldn't a 'full time employee' be at work by 9AM?] when there's an internet access problem at her home, or she has a meltdown when the verizon dsl people set up the internet access, but don't set up Yahoo Finance as a default home page (and alas, poor, poor Sarah Danishefsky can't check her stocks) something is amiss. More fodder Sam Danishefsky travels on an academic (talk) / consultancy trip and submits his airplane ticket to multiple hosts (academic/biotech) and claims 'my time is important'. ... meanwhile on more than one occasion(s) that his wife travels with him he tries to cover her ticket by submitting his multiple times and the admin doesn't feel quite right doing this ... once again Sarah Danishefsky is upset and the clearly unacceptable attempted intimidation begins. ... while she's purging her files of incriminating evidence ... OOPS! ... Add to the fray the FACT that Dr. Sarah Danishefsky in an egregious act of craven self servitude instructs a colleague (a junior but not direct report) to embargo known information relative to the availability of a clinical trial candidate [one that is out of the proverbial gate prior to Sloan's (read the bioorganic's candidate) developed by a competitor and trialed at Sloan Kettering, when high stakes milestone achievement monetary rewards are on the line ... and you have a classic case study in egregiously disingenuous conflicts of interest. ... one that may not be illegal from the perspective of the selfish Danishefsky's but acts that could cause Sloan Kettering to lose its licenses to conduct clinical trials. ... and that is why Sloan has attempted to sweep such incidents under the rug.
Add to the fray the bizarre Facilities Management fiascoes created by Sloan's Facilities team(s) ... graft, no show jobs, ducts to nowhere, cement testings never performed, OSHA and EPA citations and you have a situation where the reliability of reaction conditions in the research labs are apt to be impeached. ... and there would go kaput the entire Sloan Kettering docket of intellectual property.
The shame of all this is that the ethics lapses are completely unnecessary given the caliber of science conducted at Sloan. As to the Facilities fiascoes, its a never ending mass of what me worry construction.
Recall the brazen tack of Sloan as espoused by its CFO ... “Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer]. Though Sloan may attempt to duck this, as the website has been expunged, digital forensics could verify its prior posting.
and remember the tip of the iceberg:
[look up mskcc, osha, facilities graft, etc.]
Concrete Tests Faked Again, Officials Charge
In 2008, a company hired to test the strength of the concrete used at major public works projects in New York … falsified results, prosecutors concluded, and construction executives scrambled to find a replacement.
On Thursday, the company they selected, its owner and five employees were arraigned on charges of doing the very same thing on those two projects and hundreds of others.
In fact, none of the nearly 3,000 test reports that investigators seized from the replacement company, American Standard Testing and Consulting Laboratories, contained legitimate test results, according to one person briefed on the inquiry that led to the charges.
“The volume of fabricated tests is egregious,” the Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus R. Vance Jr., said in announcing the charges. “It was systemic; it was pervasive.”
the projects for which test results were allegedly falsified represented … a building at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, Weill Medical College, Columbia University...
what’s left unsaid is whether Sames and Sezen were ‘having an affair’. blind ambition run amok ... [look up Sames, Sezen, C&ENews] ...
don't forget to follow the money.
as to the Danishefskys, perhaps you ought to read for the purpose of understanding, as opposed to parroting the good book(s) you portend to champion. you are SUPPOSED to be our hero, not the scoundrel(s). As to Sloan, why do you allow your leadership types to act in variance with your motto 'the best cancer care anywhere'? ... perhaps you should add: as long as consistent with leaderships stock portfolios?
how about a dose of 60 minutes, drudgereport or Matt Taibbi reportage on this subject?
! Another metastasis by Sloan Kettering!... the same people who brought you Carbon Monoxide Poisoning of its selfless employees (and dispatched them on pretext when they complained about health problems caused BY MSKCC Facilities shortcomings), ductwork to nowhere in a laboratory building strewn with toxins, with supposedly mutually exclusive ductwork that was not quite mutually exclusive, concerns about filtered water conduits used universally in SKI experiments LEAKING every few feet because of poor joint adhesions [this not only calls into question the reaction conditions, but stands to impeach the entire intellectual property portfolio that emanated from MSKCC during the facilities management flaw] ... home of the AWESOME Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory, PI'd by Professor Samuel J. Danishefsky and Administered by the lovely non-clinician (who has ethics shortcomings and conflicts of interest!) Dr. Sarah Danishefsky ...
CAREFUL OVERSIGHT OF
MSKCC HARRISON FACILITY INITIATIVE
IS APPROPRIATE …
“Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer]
from the following url:
http://www.lohud.com/article/20110921/NEWS01/109210320/Sloan-Kettering-faces-state-Thursday-seeking-approval-Westchester-facility
salient features:
Sloan-Kettering faces state Thursday, seeking approval of Westchester facility
A state committee will meet Thursday to discuss a plan by a New York City cancer hospital to open a $143 million branch in Harrison — a project that has already gotten preliminary approval from the Department of Health.Even as Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center officials prepare to convince state officials that the proposed outpatient center is needed, physicians and hospital representatives from the Lower Hudson Valley are working on a strategy to defeat it.
* * *
The disingenuousness that emanates from MSKCC is inappropriately intermittently palpable. MSKCC’s Facilities Management Inititiatives are strewn with flaws, substantiated by EPA and OSHA citations.
http://www.osha.gov/pls/imis/establishment.inspection_detail?id=307012641
These shortcomings ought to be considered prior to the granting of approval for the Harrison ancillary division of MSKCC.
mskcc.legionella
mskcc.legionella
This just in! MSKCC sprouts Legionella … Legionnaire’s Disease at MSKCC?
http://www.ny1.com/content/top_stories/147409/memorial-sloan-kettering-cancer-center-warns-against-its-tap-water-after-patient-contracts-legionnaire-s-disease
OSHA was warned about this possibility in 2004! … [a salient feature of that complaint is provided below]
Stagnant water (such as that which accumulates secondary to the ceiling-leak-’phenomena’), combined with ductwork problems and an endless source of exposure to microorganisms may constitute a legionella or pneumonia (causative agent) hospitable environment and it may be appropriate to consider the installation of ultraviolet germicidal lights in the ductwork systems, similar to those apparently studied in The Lancet, (2003, 362 (9898), 1785), if such systems are not already in use and are not in variance with intermittent contact with volatile chemicals that may coincidentally ’seep’ into the ductwork.
That complaint resulted in a citation of MSKCC for ‘serious’ violations:
http://www.osha.gov/pls/imis/establishment.inspection_detail?id=307012641
To date, MSKCC’s Facilities Team continues to have a work product that results in the compromising of employee and patient safety.
In the past MSKCC had to abandon a building when they could no longer deny that their employees were being subjected to poison(s) [carbon monoxide]; In the past MSKCC built a laboratory building strewn with poisons/toxins and knowingly did not install ductwork controls; MSKCC misstated the facts relative to the severity of a ‘chlorine’ spill that required an FDNY ordered building evacuation.
! Another metastasis by Sloan Kettering!... the same people who brought you Carbon Monoxide Poisoning of its selfless employees (and dispatched them on pretext when they complained about health problems caused BY MSKCC Facilities shortcomings), ductwork to nowhere in a laboratory building strewn with toxins, with supposedly mutually exclusive ductwork that was not quite mutually exclusive, concerns about filtered water conduits used universally in SKI experiments LEAKING every few feet because of poor joint adhesions [this not only calls into question the reaction conditions, but stands to impeach the entire intellectual property portfolio that emanated from MSKCC during the facilities management flaw] ... home of the AWESOME Bioorganic Chemistry Laboratory, PI'd by Professor Samuel J. Danishefsky and Administered by the lovely non-clinician (who has ethics shortcomings and conflicts of interest!) Dr. Sarah Danishefsky ...
CAREFUL OVERSIGHT OF
MSKCC HARRISON FACILITY INITIATIVE
IS APPROPRIATE …
“Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer]
posted on the web:
Sloan-Kettering faces state Thursday, seeking approval of Westchester facility
A state committee will meet Thursday to discuss a plan by a New York City cancer hospital to open a $143 million branch in Harrison — a project that has already gotten preliminary approval from the Department of Health.Even as Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center officials prepare to convince state officials that the proposed outpatient center is needed, physicians and hospital representatives from the Lower Hudson Valley are working on a strategy to defeat it.
* * *
The disingenuousness that emanates from MSKCC is inappropriately intermittently palpable. MSKCC’s Facilities Management Inititiatives are strewn with flaws, substantiated by EPA and OSHA citations.
These shortcomings ought to be considered prior to the granting of approval for the Harrison ancillary division of MSKCC.
mskcc.legionella
mskcc.legionella
This just in! MSKCC sprouts Legionella … Legionnaire’s Disease at MSKCC?
OSHA was warned about this possibility in 2004! … [a salient feature of that complaint is provided below]
Stagnant water (such as that which accumulates secondary to the ceiling-leak-’phenomena’), combined with ductwork problems and an endless source of exposure to microorganisms may constitute a legionella or pneumonia (causative agent) hospitable environment and it may be appropriate to consider the installation of ultraviolet germicidal lights in the ductwork systems, similar to those apparently studied in The Lancet, (2003, 362 (9898), 1785), if such systems are not already in use and are not in variance with intermittent contact with volatile chemicals that may coincidentally ’seep’ into the ductwork.
That complaint resulted in a citation of MSKCC for ‘serious’ violations:
To date, MSKCC’s Facilities Team continues to have a work product that results in the compromising of employee and patient safety.
In the past MSKCC had to abandon a building when they could no longer deny that their employees were being subjected to poison(s) [carbon monoxide]; In the past MSKCC built a laboratory building strewn with poisons/toxins and knowingly did not install ductwork controls; MSKCC misstated the facts relative to the severity of a ‘chlorine’ spill that required an FDNY ordered building evacuation.
...oops .. that is of course, pretense (not pretext) ... so, so sorry ...
... oh yeah, and it's the fume hoods that are SUPPOSED to be mutually exclusive but curiously have a 'cross contamination' ...
... Sara F. says Chris/Christine Hickey, 'spokesperson'/director of communications of MSKCC has had a history of substance abuse (!cocaine!) in her family. Wouldn't it be appropriate if the 'director of communications' Sloan's propaganda [redacted] public affairs department was involved in/affiliated with psychoactive recreational drug use?
... Talmudic scholars with ethics anomalies at Sloan Kettering? Ought they not read for understanding the good book(s)? ... especially when they know better.
... a Facilities Management team that proverbially doesn't know which way is up? ... patient / employee safety fiascoes based upon egregious facilities management shortcomings at Sloan Kettering ought not to surprise anyone.
... Sloan Kettering, the best cancer care anywhere, as long as it's consistent with its revenue stream and/or the potential profit of powerful non-clinician PI's and their non-clinician spouses ... oy. craven self-servitude, to the max, MSKCC! keep up the good work!
The Dirty Yews of Sloan [or Something Funny Happened On The Way To Stockholm] … The Pacific Yew Tree – Taxus brefivolia is an evergreen tree found in the Pacific North West. The chemotherapy drug paclitaxel used in breast, ovarian and lung cancer treatment is derived from Taxu brevifolia. The Danishefsky total synthesis of taxol (the third!, behind Holton and KC [hold the presses!] Nicolaou) completed the task via Baccatin III a natural product similar to taxol found in the harvestable (without removing the bark and thereby harming the Yew Tree) needles. The taxol race was high profile with much braggadocio prattled by its saber rattling Principal Investigator competitors. Danishefsky’s team nearly pulled off the coup, if not for the discovery team of postdoctorals dropping their guard and trusting the scaled up (previously solved piece of the puzzle farmed out) material provided by the (MSKCC/Sloan-Kettering Institute’s) in-house “prep” [preparative synthesis core facility] lab, whose personnel ordered the WRONG isomer of Wieland–Miescher Ketone, dooming an otherwise ultimately completed synthesis (purportedly all was solved save no-brainer synthetic accoutrements) to the wrong optical rotation, i.e. the non-natural product. Bill Bormann Ph.D. headed that Prep-Lab effort and Professor Danishefsky has referred to Bill as a “bird-brain” [note the editor of this comment does not necessarily agree with that description of Bill who was treated like a door-mat while at Sloan]. Danishefsky’s Post-Docs thought of dispatching Bill after Gilbert Stork’s team checked the optical rotation of the all but complete molecule [something Danishefsky’s discovery team of post-docs should have done before incorporating “Bird-Brain” Bill’s Prep-Lab contribution to the effort]. Danishefsky’s team dropped out of the Taxol playoffs and watched when Holton (whose paper was scrutinized/peer reviewed to a fault), yet bizarrely and curiously Nature held the presses while the pure as the driven snow KC Nicolaou (et al.) slurped their ink still dripping on the manuscript paper to the Editorial Board of Nature who promptly rubber stamped the paper in world record time. And so, another curious “tie” in science (remember when the French isolated HIV, and we (the Americans!) stole it from the French, but the Gipper (President Reagan) brokered a “tie” (don’t forget to follow the [potential!] money) … things were not hunky-dory at Sloan when the Taxol papers appeared. … fast forward, the Gordon Conferences serve up a natural product whose M.O. mode of action is not unlike Taxol, but which may have more clinical (anticancer) superpowers and less (clinical) side effects! … voila, a potential Billion Dollar Molecule! … and so the race is now on to best the others in the quest to synthesize the epothilones. This initiative is successful although the nefarious KCN (a.k.a. [to quote Erik Sorensen:] “that Bastard” (KCN, that is) was involved in some dubious IP coup v. Danishefsky attempts. There were concerns in the lab relative to appropriately signing daily lab notebooks (baad Dongfang Meng … and don’t p** on the floor either! as others need to tip toe around the resultant yellow river …), some reports of postdoctorals keeping two books (baaad Craig Coburn!) and questions about the scientific methodology of a molecular pharmacology colleague that was written off to being the result of a “cultural difference”; however, when one supplies a molecular pharmacologist with umpteen “nude mice” that are apt to get sick if you look at them the wrong way, or if the nipple on the water bottle leaks into the cedar bed of the mouse cage they’ll pass (die) through the night … but Dr. Chou gets all these mice, umpteen die for whatever reason and are not counted in an experiment and there are something akin to 3 mice left and if one does a reverse log graphs the Sloan analogue is a bit better than Bristol’s or Novartis’s or whatever and therefore Sarah Danishefsky is apt to declare “ours are better than theirs” and based on that questionable premise instruct a colleague to embargo known information relative to the availability of clinical trial candidates of competitors’ (Bristol/Novartis) compounds being vetted at Sloan Kettering from desperate cancer patients or their proxies who ferret out the lab following the publication of an article about epothilones in the high profile, (from a medical perspective, lay press WSJ)! After all, though Sloan’s candidate was not out of the proverbial starting gate yet, very large milestone royalty payments were on the line and Sarah Danishefsky, non clinician Administrative Manager of the Bioorganic Chemistry Lab and spouse of its Awesome PI saw fit to act in a cravenly self – serving manner. When this incident was relayed to an SKI colleague (Neal Rosen!) the Editorial and Graphics Specialist was warned that though such action was selfish it was not illegal for the Danishefsky’s to do, however, Sloan could be penalized (lose its license to conduct clinical trials) and therefore the incident would need to be swept under the rug (actually Neal was not so circumspect in his choice of words). Meanwhile it was reported by “Bird-Brain” [Samuel J. Danishefsky’s adjective] Bill Bormann that the head of Clinical Trials at Sloan (Dr. David Spriggs!) was irritated at Sam Danishefsky because he (a non-clinician) was pressuring Spriggs to continue enrolling patients in the by then being conducted clinical trial on the Sloan Kettering (Bioorganic Chemistry) epothilone derivative against his (Spriggs’) better clinical judgment. This is important because above mentioned milestone achievement royalty payments are based on milestones such as completing a clinical trial phase and would not be granted if the clinician stopped enrolling patients in the study. This is an egregious conflict of interest. When reported to MSKCC HR (Shaun Smith!), attempts were made to sweep this, too, under the rug. … Then we have the MSKCC Facilities Management follies [Ed Mahoney is its incumbent VP]: Sloan’s selfless employees in an ancillary building were getting SICK. When they reported their illnesses to MSKCC workers who up until that point were annually appraised as outstanding were dispatched on pretense. Sloan attempted to thwart attempts to investigate the causes and had to ABANDON the building when they could no longer duck the fact that MSKCC Facilities Management flaws resulted in its employees being POISONED by CARBON MONOXIDE. Having been privy to Sloan’s intransigence, inappropriate and nasty tack on that matter re proper addressment of this egregious safety flaw, the Editorial / Graphics Specialist was not a fan of the way the Public Affairs and Facilities Team operated. PA and Facilities work FOR SKI/MSKCC, not the other way around. PA and Facilities need to follow proper Safety doctrines, not dictate conjured and synchronized cover stories or versions thereof when it suits their needs. Being a relative non-transient (compared with the postdocs who stay at most 3 years), the Ed/Graph Spec was asked to take a C14 Chemistry Laboratory Certificate of Fitness Exam. Having passed the exam he became one of a few COF Holders on RRL 13. There were concerns of a “cross contamination” between supposedly mutually exclusive fume hoods reported by circumspect postdoctorals, wherein expunged fumes were somehow being recirculated (e.g. chemists from one lab would smell compounds not being used in their lab). This is a concern as one researcher may use a cyanide containing compound while using proper ventilation masks, while another researcher may be preparing a reaction with a stir bar and magnetic plate without proper respiratory protection and may breathe in a fume supposedly vented from another fume hood. One bizarre episode involved alarms sounding, chemists smelling “chlorine” or “bromine”, permeation throughout the floor, an evacuation of the building following an obvious lack of control by MSKCC Safety (a Safety officer refused to enter an area without a gas mask … a curious event as RRL 13 had lobbied for placement of such protection on the floor, but that request was denied). After the event Sloan attempted an inaccurate assuagement of the incident via a note signed by its head of Safety, but possibly ghosted by others (e.g. Public Affairs). When challenged, MSKCC Facilities merely threatened the Sloan C14 COF “you upset a lot of people when you mentioned OSHA”. However unit integrity also equals unit safety even if it means addressing MSKCC Facilities Management shortcomings. Sloan unbelievably but in fact chose NOT to install ductwork controls in the laboratory building strewn with toxins. Other Facilities follies included leaking of water through live electrical light fixtures, possibly from ductwork and/or filtered water conduits whose water is used somewhat universally in SKI experiments. If the integrity of those filtered water conduits are impeached then the efficacy of published results based on experiments that used that “purified water”, clinical candidates that result from such experiments and alas, the Intellectual Property Portfolio that results from those experiments, too must be questioned. More reasons for Sloan to attempt to sweep under the rug these problems. Then Sloan sought a new laboratory building but they could not tell the surrounding and rightfully concerned CB8M Community that it was in fact a replacement building. The ruse invoked was fun to watch, but sad indeed. Sloan’s facilities flaws continue to date, with charges of graft (no show jobs, falsified concrete tests) and even a recent legionella exposure (a situation presciently addressed in the OSHA complaint of 2004 that resulted in Sloan’s citation):
Stagnant water (such as that which accumulates secondary to the ceiling-leak-’phenomena’), combined with ductwork problems and an endless source of exposure to microorganisms may constitute a legionella or pneumonia (causative agent) hospitable environment and it may be appropriate to consider the installation of ultraviolet germicidal lights in the ductwork systems, similar to those apparently studied in The Lancet, (2003, 362 (9898), 1785), if such systems are not already in use and are not in variance with intermittent contact with volatile chemicals that may coincidentally ’seep’ into the ductwork.
http://www.osha.gov/pls/imis/establishment.inspection_detail?id=307012641
Sloan has also been cited by the EPA.
Dr. David Golde, erstwhile MSKCC Physician in Chief committed suicide via the two whole method (bullet entry/exit wound). It was reported that he had a virulent cancer and (unverified) that the Feds were closing in on other matters.
Zvi Fuks, the Oracle behind Imclone who matched a foundling drug (eventually referred to as erbitux) with a company who sought a raison d’etre was purportedly tipped off during what became known as the Imclone insider stock anomalies.
There were also funny anomalies relative to bookkeeping in the Bioorganic Laboratory. Sarah Danishefsky would deign to show up at work, perhaps 50% time even though she was a “full time employee”, would interrupt SKI work by complaining over the phone about not being able to check her stocks via the internet, and there were funny bookkeeping initiatives; e.g. when the PI would travel at times he’d submit multiple times, to different places his ticket for reimbursement (e.g. academic talks combined with consultancies) and justify the double billing by stating that his time was important. He’d do the same to cover his wife’s ticket. When the admin charged with filing such reimbursements felt uncomfortable he was taken off the assignment and treated in a threatening manner by the PI and / or his spouse, the conflicted (interests!) “full time employee” Dr. Sarah Danishefsky.
Relative to the Danishefsky’s stocks, SJD was affiliated with Ariad, either on its scientific board or perhaps a scientific founder. When other biotech stocks flourished in ~ 1999 Ariad, embroiled in an intellectual property legal impediment, floundered at ~ 50 cents. When the case was settled, the stock rocketed to ca. 50 dollars (a 10,000% or 100X increase) in perhaps a four month period, until the (bio)tech stock bubble burst ca. March of 2000 [when Clinton and Blair had a joint news conference stating their intention to share genomic data and possibly hindering the ability to patent genes]. Ariad insiders would have been privy to when the settlement would occur and may have been liberal in passing this information on to others. Are there Ariad millionaires at Sloan? Are you an Ariad millionaire?
John Deutch the erstwhile DCI, Director of Central Intelligence (the CIA!) under Clinton, who was admonished for removing top secret computers from the agency (did he leave them at a Starbucks?) was granted a seconds to midnight pardon by President Clinton while Hillary was proverbally stealing the White House silverware. John Deutch has also been a chemistry professor at MIT, is a member of the proverbial Cambridge (MA, not UK!) Curia of king makers and has been affiliated with Ariad in a Board/Director and/or Advisor type capacity. Wouldn’t it be curious if any Clinton affiliate (e.g. Hillary, Chelsea, Bill?) happened to be an Ariad tippee and had an Ariad windfall prior to the Clinton pardon?
Ed Sausville vetted an NIH RAID (rapid application to industrial development, meant as a bridge to clinical development) grant for the bioorganic chemistry lab for its epothilone derivatives. It was granted. (remember, Sarah Danishefsky, accepts gov’t money to vet epothilones, yet attempts to steer people away from the clinical trials of competing compounds conducted at Sloan, an egregious conflict of interest from a non clinician). Sausville has since sat on the Scientific Advisory Board of the Biotech Company (since purchased by Bristol Myers Squibb) that developed the Sloan Kettering portfolio of epothilones [Kosan].
The Danishefskys have practiced mucophagy and rhinotillexamania. (for SJD, ear wax, too). [For SJD its apparently an absentminded pastime (perhaps he could take up painting as a pastime as did WC), but for Sarah it may very well be an insult conducted in front of people she considers herself better than].
Now Sloan is attempting to metastasize to Harrison. The mission of MSKCC is nonpareil and most of its employees are selfless and truly care. However, there are clinicians, suits and researchers in high places who inappropriately drop their guard and act selfishly to a fault. This is hurtful as these people clearly know better. Remember the statement: “Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer].
Sloan boasts as having the “best cancer care anywhere” … apparently as long as its consistent with Sloan’s revenue stream and/or the potential profit of high profile non clinicians stock portfolios.
There are many people who selflessly work at Sloan when they could be working in the for profit sector. When these employees rightfully bring concerns to the fore they are often dispatched under pretense (i.e. thrown under a bus). The admittedly critical tone of this summary of events is a rebuttal to such unacceptable attempts to bully and sweep under the rug egregious conflicts of interest and safety flaws. Just gifting Sloan back the bus that she’s apt to inappropriately attempt to toss others under.
! MSKCCheats / TheDanishefskyDeception ! … Stealing Hope One Clinical Trial Enrolee At A Time?? … when they ought to be steeling hope. …
Boo MSKCC, you know better, especially people who claim to personify a high level of religiosity. Why don’t you provide leadership by example?
Given the history of Facilities Management and Construction Flaws and Sloan’s curious (even if swept under the rug) conflicts of interest and ethics anomalies, it is appropriate to watch that ancillary expansion initiative closely and circumspectly.
Best wishes to the Danishefskys as they celebrate their new year with a big shout out for the goodness and betterment they've provided mankind and the kindness with which they've always conducted themselves!
... actually, the Danishefskys have got to be some of the most disingenuous people on the planet.
oh yeah, almost forgot!!
re the Ariad anecdotes of above,
Don Wiley a world renowned virologist, one of the 'missing [or dead!] scientists' of post 9/11 conspiracy theorist fame [this factoid for your edification, not implying acceptance/or/denial of this missing/dead scientist conspiracy theories] ... just happened to fall off of a bridge [above the Mississippi while attending an SAB (scientific advisory board) type meeting ... and his body was discovered perhaps 10 days later down stream. ... just happened to fall off of a bridge. Don was pals with other members of the Cambridge (MA/not UK!) Curia of biotech/big pharma academia king makers [e.g. an aspirant to that gang, Greg Verdine, of Harvard's renowned Chemistry Department]. GV was apparently a founding scientist of Ariad! Wouldn't it be a coincidence if Wiley was an Ariad millionaire? Were you?
re: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/manhattan/digging_up_secret_slay_Hnx86uB1mMi6BPdjLqTaIN
Professor Danishefsky's brother runs a boutique shop within (formerly) Merrill, now at USB along with his brother's son and (formerly) his brother's daughter who (see above) had an untimely demise. There is no implied Ariad connection here.
For brevity we won't resurrect the previously mentioned Corey cache of suicides [go*gle lethal chemistry at harvard], or the whole sezen (Dali, [academic] Son of Sam [don't have a relationship with your graduate student ... at least until the ink is dry on her (hopefully) true veracity thesis ...
Suggestion of the Day! ... that Sloan's CFO and Drs. Danishefsky 'present' (with powerpoint!) at the Occupy Wall Street initiatives ...
“Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer]
MSKCC, 'the best cancer care anywhere' ... as long as it's consistent with the potential profit of the institute and/or the stock portfolios of its powerful researchers/suits ...
Let us cite/paraphrase a few salient features of MLK’s speeches:
And there is deep down within all of us an instinct. It's a kind of drum major instinct—a desire to be out front, a desire to lead the parade, a desire to be first. And it is something that runs the whole gamut of life … A Dream, to be … judged by … the content of their character.
Institutes and people capable of such a high caliber work product ought to provide leadership by example (be a drum major!) and not act in a manner that reflects a poor content of character (craven self servitude) …
MSKCC, the best cancer care anywhere! …
Matt Taibbi
Writer/Editor
Rolling Stone Magazine
January 2012
Dear Matt,
I read with interest your Vampire Squid story in Rolling Stone and subsequently, recently Griftopia. Analogous to Goldman Sachs’ role in Griftopia, perhaps MSKCC, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center may also have a place in the Cancer-Racket Facet of Griftopia. The enclosed information may be of interest to you and/or Rolling Stone as a seed for an investigation and/or article:
Something Funny Happened On The Way To Stockholm !! … The Pacific Yew Tree – ...
* * *
Dan Mangan
The New York Post
January 2012
Dear Mr. Mangan,
I read with interest your article relative to the unfortunate demise of Ms. Danishefsky. The enclosed information may be of interest to you and/or The New York Post as a seed for an investigation and/or article:
Something Funny Happened On The Way To Stockholm !! …
* * *
“Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer]
... The Billion Dollar Boo-Boo ... So who in 'Bird-Brain' Bill's Prep Lab made the proverbial BDB-B?? (ordering the wrong WMK whose use rendered the virtually complete natural product synthesis of taxol enantiomerically moot) ?? [note: the author of this note does not agree with SJD's adjective description of Bill] ...
Something to think about for our lovely pure as the driven snow 'friends' at MSKCC (and other likeminded institutions). ....
Cheat - to defraud; swindle; to deceive; influence by fraud; to elude; deprive of something expected; to practice fraud or deceit; to violate rules or regulations; to take an examination or test in a dishonest way, as by improper access to answers; a person who acts dishonestly, deceives, or defrauds; a fraud; swindle; deception; Law . the fraudulent obtaining of another's property by a pretense or trick; an impostor: The man who passed as an earl was a cheat.
Synonyms: mislead, dupe, delude; gull, con; hoax, fool. Cheat, deceive, trick, victimize refer to the use of fraud or artifice deliberately to hoodwink or obtain an unfair advantage over someone. Cheat implies conducting matters fraudulently, especially for profit to oneself: to cheat at cards. Deceive suggests deliberately misleading or deluding, to produce misunderstanding or to prevent someone from knowing the truth: to deceive one's parents. To trick is to deceive by a stratagem, often of a petty, crafty, or dishonorable kind: to trick someone into signing a note. To victimize is to make a victim of; the emotional connotation makes the cheating, deception, or trickery seem particularly dastardly: to victimize a blind man; swindler, trickster, sharper, dodger, charlatan, fraud, fake, phony, mountebank; imposture, artifice, trick, hoax.
... remember, you ARE supposed to CARE ...
! Happy Birthday Sam !
Conflict of Interest – a situation where the tending of one duty leads to disregard of another
You or a loved one may be in a desperate cancer scare situation when blindly entrusting their (or your) health to a place such as MSKCC, while self-serving non-clinicians at that Institute may attempt to influence your treatment based on potential financial gain v. your (i.e. your health’s) best interest(s).
MSKCC has a history of curiously bizarre Facilities Management shortcomings that stand to affect and may very well have effected patient, worker and community safety. When MSKCC ought to have been sending in the clones, have they, in the form of its Facilities team, sent in the clowns?
Has Sloan conjured and synchronized cover stories in order to attempt to sweep egregious transgressions and shortcomings under the proverbial rug?
“Oh, we already knew that!” paraphrasing an HHMI funded researcher commenting after reading an !MSKCCheats/TheDanishefskyDeception! [stealing hope one clinical trial enrollee at a time?? (when they ought to be steeling hope)] - leak/posting
“That Ho*k Nosed [redacted!] B*stard” … ?? WHAT ?? paraphrasing Dr. J*hn M*sters (referring to KC Nicolaou of all “b*stards”!), [de facto discovery (post-doc) team lead on the Danishefsky OOPS almost first! Synthesis of Taxol … (were it not foiled by “Bird-Brain” Bill’s [Danishefsky’s adjective, the editor of this posting does not concur and feels Bornman was wrongly treated like a door-mat while at MSKCC]) shop when his (Dr. M’s) colleagues took him out to some commuter “club” (chosen by WTG, Wendy The Great) … in order to show unit integrity …when it became apparent that Drs. Holton and God forbid KC Nicolaou (the [Erik S*rensen concurs!] “b*stard”!! ) bested the Danishefsky effort following the WM-Ketone fiasco. Dr. M*sters was then apprised that although KCNicolaou might very well be a b*stard! he had neither a “ho*k nose”, nor was he a [redacted] (note, two of the attendees of the unit integrity initiative [vide supra] at the commuter crowd joint venue chosen by WTGreat are [redacted], including the editor of this comment. We also pointed out that although our fearless (if not necessarily purely ethical! [Drs. D. actions are so, so sadly apt to wrongly personify negative generalizations of [redacted] people]) leader might very well have intermittently been a B*STARD, (for other reasons!) he, too, did not have a “ho*k nose” (though picking it is another story) .. but he is [redacted]. Dr. M. subsequently apologized to his colleagues (and, too, the [redacted] ones) for his comments. The apology from this otherwise off scale (high caliber!) person was duly accepted.
Greg Verdine, an Ariad insider (are YOU an Ariad millionaire?!?) has sat on (and may still be an incumbent on) SKI’s Scientific Advisory Board. Don (fall off a bridge) Wiley was a colleague of Professor Verdine.
Gustave J. Bernhardt (aka Gus Bernhardt) has been the leftenant to Mr. James Quirk of MSKCC/SKI’s Research Resources Management team and may have become its Director. Dr. Sarah Danishefsky has stated (paraphrased) that Mr. Quirk is OK, but that she doesn’t think that Gus is at Jim Quirk’s (skill set) level. A Puppet is someone whose actions are prompted and controlled by another or others. Puppets make great stocking stuffers.
This just in: Word on the street is that MSKCC is once again attempting to metastasize [redacted, expand!], this time looking for an outpatient facility close to its main campus. MSKCC’s attempts to bully the local (CB8M!) community have been successfully thwarted in the past (e.g. a non-competitive New York Eye and Ear Infirmary buy-out initiative).
Jennifer [nee] Brooks worked with the MSKCC Industrial Affairs Office (now Office of Technology Development) under Andrew Maslow and liaised with the Danishefsky laboratory. Her fiancé/thence husband is in finance. Did she not leave MSKCC shortly after Ariad stock peaked? There is no implied Ariad connection here or an implication that anyone (whether or not affiliated with Ariad or MSKCC) was involved in a “pump and dump” scenario/initiative. Are YOU an Ariad millionaire?
There are people (some at MSKCC) who are non-clinicians who attempt to influence enrollment in clinical trials based on potential profit they may realize. Shame on you Drs. Danishefsky. Shame on you MSKCC. You know better. We want you to be our hero. We want you to provide leadership by example. Boo.
Weasel – a cunning, sneaky person!
“Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer]
Ignore the man behind the curtain? … But what if you’re the curtain and the man behind it (or his spouse or Institute!) act inappropriately?
MSKCC has a history of conjuring and synchronizing cover-stories in an attempt to sweep under the rug egregious Conflict of Interest, and Ethics and Facilities Management shortcomings. We all lose because of that.
Ed Mahoney is the incumbent MSKCC VP/Facilities Management.
A milquestoast is a meek, submissive or timid person.
Shelly Friedman has represented MSKCC in real estate matters.
A shyster is a lawyer who uses unprofessional or questionable methods or a person who gets along by petty, sharp practices.
It is one thing to take pride in and even operate with a modicum of moxie relative to a brilliant work product. It is another to cross that line where clearly unnecessary disingenuousness, and craven self-servitude reach the point of curdling the contents of one’s stomach.
The Hippocratic Oath ... first do no harm ... v. The Hypocritic Oath??
BOO, you know better Drs. Danishefsky. You know better MSKCC. We want you to provide leadership by example.
http://www.osha.gov/pls/imis/establishment.inspection_detail?id=307012641
God knows all …
! Happy Birthday Professor D !
Timothy Cardinal Dolan
c/o Archbishop's Delegate For Healthcare
Dear Cardinal Dolan,
The enclosed information may be of interest to you and/or The Archdiocese as a seed for an investigation relative to Medical Conflicts of Interest and Ethics Concerns, especially given that those with faulty moral compasses also exhibit craven self-servitude, combined with shameless self-promotion and clearly know better:
Something Funny Happened On The Way To Stockholm !! … The Pacific Yew Tree – ...
MSKCC, the best cancer care anywhere, as long as it's consistent with the revenue stream of that institute.
Are YOU an MSKCC Clinical Trials Pawn?? ...
Have YOU been on the short end of a non-clinician's craven, self-servitude, when they attempt to manipulate/influence enrollment in clinical trials when very large milestone (dependent upon completion of a clinical trial 'phase' [i.e. if a 'phase' is completed, the royalty is paid, if for any reason, e.g. the clinician overseeing clinical trials deems the drug candidate's efficacy to not be worthy of further study and suspends enrollment, the royalty payment is not made]) royalties lay in the balance?? Does this occur at MSKCC??
Does MSKCC conjure and synchronize 'gray area' cover stories in a vainglorious attempt to sweep these egregious lapses in ethics and bizarre episodes of 'conflicts of interest' shamelessly conducted by people who clearly know better?
Puppets from the MSKCC Research Resources Management (e.g. Gus(tave) Bernhardt [who formerly reported to James (Jim) Quirk who in turn answered to John Gunn (MSKCC Executive Vice President) and thence its President (Paul Marks, Harold Varmus, now Craig Thompson [who is now embroiled in his own he said/she said intellectual property imborglio [he's been referred to as 'unscrupulous' by Penn relative to his alleged IP (intellectual property) absconsions] are charged with attempting to sweep these matters under the rug.
MSKCC's Propaganda [redacted, Public Affairs] department, too, ghosts attempts to assuage concern over these COIs (conflicts of interest) and Ethics concerns. Chris(tine) Hickey has been MSKCCs spokesperson and has held other senior positions within that department. According to Sara Frei* Chris has had a psychoactive drug abuse problem in her family (coc*ine??). Lovely! How appropriate.
MSKCC's Facilities Management (its incumbent VP is Ed Mahoney) team has been responsible for egregious safety shortcomings that stand to affect and have likely effected employee and community safety AND reaction conditions within its research branch including, but not limited to the need to abandon a building after poisoning (Carbon Monoxide!) its (MSKCC's) selfless employees (MSKCC dispatched on pretense employees who rightfully brought these safety concerns to the fore); MSKCC built a laboratory building and knowingly did not install ductwork control, its fume hoods systemically cross contaminated and there were concerns relative to conduit efficacy for its purified water system (used somewhat universally in SKI's research).
“Sloan is pursuing a systemic approach to reducing expenses and increasing revenues […] One example of this is discouraging terminally ill patients from seeking initial treatment or second opinions from the cancer center […] the admission of such patients is counterproductive […] to Sloan Kettering.” [paraphrasing salient features, MSKCC, CFO/Chief Financial Officer].
http://www.osha.gov/pls/imis/establishment.inspection_detail?id=307012641
Shame on you MSKCC, you know better. Shame on you Drs. Danishefsky we KNOW YOU know better ... we want you to be our hero !! we TRUSTED you. Boo.
cc:
His Holiness the Dalai Lama
c/o His Administrative Office
Archbishop of Canterbury
Lambeth Palace
Rabbi Joseph Potasnik
Executive Vice President
New York Board of Rabbis