ESHS/HSS Annual Meeting

Evaluating ‘Socialist’ Cancer Drugs: The Case of the Clinical Trials within the COMECON’s Oncology Program

• In Event: The Politics, Epistemology and Ethics of Medical Evidence, ca. 1960–ca. 2000

English Abstract

In the 1970s and 1980s, the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (COMECON) played a pivotal role in the coordination of biomedical research, including in oncology, across the socialist world. Transnational clinical trials were organised between the USSR, Bulgaria, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, the GDR and Cuba. These randomised controlled clinical trials (RCTs) often aimed to evaluate the efficacy of 'socialist drugs' compared to 'capitalist' therapeutic standards. Drawing on archival research and oral history, this presentation will focus on COMECON’s clinical trials involving two chemotherapies in particular: Carminomycin (developed in the USSR), and Dibromodulcitol (developed in Hungary). We will see that the COMECON oncology clinical trials represented a form of transnational cancer research that mirrored the 'cooperative group' in the West. However, it also formed part of an attempt to prioritise drugs developed by COMECON member countries in order to avoid costly importation. Furthermore, it formed part of an endeavour to export 'socialist' drugs to the West to generate revenue and increase global recognition. My contribution questions the alignment of clinical trials with Western epistemology, contrasting it with other methods of assessing drugs in state socialist countries, particularly described in the USSR, where priority was given to evidence stemming from clinicians' expertise and 'pragmatic' trials. Overall, I argue that the specificity of COMECON's clinical trials lies in the adoption of RCTs to value 'socialist' drugs, as well as being part of a regulatory framework that aimed to both assess efficacy and to drastically limit the quantity of drugs in the pharmacopoeia.

Author

• Nils Graber, Humboldt University