The much-publicized case in the mid-1990s of Dr. Nancy Olivieri and Apotex Pharmaceuticals highlighted the tension between commercial confidentiality and academic openness. Olivieri was conducting a clinical trial of an Apotex drug and was obligated under contract not to release information about the trial without the agreement of the company. But she developed concerns about the drug and informed trial participants, even though the company refused to consent to this disclosure. Her research was cancelled, and she was threatened with a lawsuit. Some prominent academics rallied to support her, and the principles of research and clinical ethics and academic freedom. The case became a cause célèbre.
In its wake, Canadian universities scrambled to tighten up their policies and procedures. Contracts are now carefully scrutinized, and at the University of Toronto a keystone policy (based on the notion that “dissemination of knowledge is one of the primary functions of the university”) is the right for researchers to publish the results of research in a timely fashion, says Jennifer MacInnis, director of intellectual property and contracts. Still, companies that fund research regularly try to push the boundaries — inserting clauses that effectively aim to block academics from publishing research results, for example. Because there is no common stance among universities about acceptable terms for industry-academic relationships, industry does try to play off institutions against each other. “You know, so-and-so agreed to this, why don’t you?” MacInnis says. “But because of our size, it is difficult for a company to bully U of T.”
David Wolfe, co-director of the Centre for International Studies at the University of Toronto, says that universities have, to a large extent, let federal government programs define research programs, and sometimes priorities. The result reinforces a trend toward more targeted and applied research, and there is a growing sense that this and other developments are jeopardizing the long-term status of basic, curiosity-driven research.
That recognition has been articulated by a number of eminent scientists. Dr. Fraser Mustard, one of the architects of the Networks of Centres of Excellence, dismissed as wrong-headed the government’s expectation that after fourteen years the networks should be self-sufficient. “Whoever set up this policy of commercialization, basically what you have is a crew of characters doing public policy who don’t understand the subject. What you end up doing is pulling all your money away from the fundamental research,” argued Mustard, who also founded the Canadian Institutes for Advanced Research.
University of Toronto chemistry professor and Nobel Prize winner John Polanyi wrote in the November–December 2004 issue of the Innovation Canada newsletter: “When we tie discovery research too closely to development, we force our university scientists to run while hobbled in a three-legged race, one leg tied too nearly to industry. This is a mistake we are now making.” And to Ursula Franklin, physicist and University of Toronto professor emerita, the emphasis on commercialization amounts to “depleting the groundwater” of basic discovery science “with endless irrigation projects.” Furthermore, she maintains that much excellent science is now being marginalized because of the emphasis on funding research likely to be of interest to industry.
Many scientists are worried that all basic research is jeopardized. With its reinvestment in research infrastructure and personnel, Canada has managed to cultivate and lure back world-class scientists and create an impressive research climate. Still, there is concern that operating funds to finance the research are lagging behind, putting the enterprise at risk. The competition for cihr research funding is now so stiff that the agency is able to fund only about one in five projects applied for, leaving many excellent researchers and projects unfunded. In November 2006, eleven distinguished Canadian scientists, including Polanyi, wrote to Prime Minister Harper out of concern “that without substantial new investments” in basic research, particularly in the convergence of life sciences and physical sciences, Canada faces the prospect of “a steady erosion of our international competitiveness.”
Almost all of the major reinvestment in research took place while the Liberals were in Ottawa. The Conservatives, while not demonstrating enthusiastic support for all scientific fields since they took power in 2006 (think climate change, for example), have expressed interest in health-related research and have provided increases for cfi, cihr, Genome Canada, and the Canada Research Chair program. And commercialization appears to be central to their planning: a private sector committee was given a key role in selecting recipients for the government’s main new funding initiative, the Centres of Excellence for Commercialization and Research.
Publicly funded university research is often the source of discoveries that lead to new patentable drugs or equipment. This raises a couple of issues. Much ink has been spilled in government-sponsored reports on how to increase Canadian investment in promising biotechnology companies and to keep them, and jobs, in Canada. But not much has changed on the ground. “You don’t want to be a Luddite, but you have to wonder about the fact that we fund this research, which starts to get developed here but is eventually bought by a foreign company. Then we have to buy the drug or whatever at a high cost for our health care system,” said the head of a cancer organization (who didn’t want to be identified).
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