An investigation has revealed hundreds of undisclosed payments from pharma companies to the organisations responsible for buying and commissioning our healthcare services.

NHS organisations responsible for buying healthcare services have accepted hundreds of ‘secret’ payments from drug companies, an investigation has revealed.

Clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) in England have been handed more than £3.7 million by pharmaceutical companies in payments they failed to disclose to patients or the public, leading medical journal the BMJ said today.

The researchers – who filed hundreds of FOI requests to CCGs across the country – point out that it is inappropriate for commissioning bodies to accept funding from the private sector which might influence procurement decisions.

NHS England guidance also requires CCGs to declare all conflicts of interest, and maintain an up to date public list of such disclosures.

Piotr Ozieranski, a lecturer at the University of Bath who worked with The BMJ on researching the payments, said:

“It seems rather peculiar that CCGs are permitted to accept any payments or benefits in kind from private sector companies.”

The scale of the undisclosed payments is enormous.

While publicly declared payments include tickets to top sports matches and a Beyoncé concert, only two thirds of the 4,600 payments – and a quarter of the value – that CCGs accepted from private companies and charities in 2015-16 and 2016-17 were listed in registers or declarations published by them.

The total monetary value of payments identified in CCGs’ publicly available registers that covered either the calendar years 2015 and 2016 or the tax years 2015-16 and 2016-17 was £1,283,767, whereas at least £5,027,818 has been identified in the payments listed in responses to The BMJ’s FOI requests.

But CCGs differ widely in their integrity, the research found.

More than half of the questionable payments were made to just nine of more than 200 groups in England.

Many CCGs accept no payments from charities or private companies. For example, NHS Hastings and Rother CCG told The BMJ this “helps to avoid any potential or real situations of undue bias or influence in the decision making of the membership of the CCG, governing bodies, or staff.”

Among those that did accept and fail to disclose payments from private companies, most funding went to cover education and training events, internal meetings or projects.

The Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry told the BMJ that drug companies have an important role in supporting healthcare organisations and they “share an ambition with the NHS to see greater transparency and disclosure of information around industry support to healthcare organisations and professionals.”

Several CCGs say sponsorship arrangements with drug companies allow them to host more educational events than they otherwise could.

But professor Paul Glasziou at the Centre for Research in Evidence-Based Practice at Bond University in Australia, argues that doctors are often unaware of the effect of drug companies’ activities on their own behaviour.

He said:

“Pharmaceutical company dominance of the funding of continuing medical education can result in prescribing that harms.”

When asked why they had not published details of drug company payments, CCGs gave a variety of responses, such as believing there is no requirement to do so and citing problems sourcing information about event sponsorship from organisations to which the work had been outsourced.

Many have now said they will improve the way in which they declare private payments.

Charlotte England is a freelance journalist and writer at Left Foot Forward. Follow her on Twitter.

As you’re here, we have something to ask you. What we do here to deliver real news is more important than ever. But there’s a problem: we need readers like you to chip in to help us survive. We deliver progressive, independent media, that challenges the right’s hateful rhetoric. Together we can find the stories that get lost.

We’re not bankrolled by billionaire donors, but rely on readers chipping in whatever they can afford to protect our independence. What we do isn’t free, and we run on a shoestring. Can you help by chipping in as little as £1 a week to help us survive? Whatever you can donate, we’re so grateful - and we will ensure your money goes as far as possible to deliver hard-hitting news.