Debate about Funding Comparative-Effectiveness Research

The proposal to include 1. 1 billion for comparative-effectiveness research (CER) in the federal stimulus package encountered a vigorous and well-coordinated backlash. The campaign to gut this funding ultimately failed, but the debate it engendered and the resonance of the opposition's arguments in both lay and policy circles reveal much about the issues that will surround such research and its application in the coming years. The contested provisions were designed to support studies comparing the efficacy and safety (and, by extension, the cost-effectiveness) of alternative ways of addressing common clinical problems. Interventions to be evaluated will include pharmaceuticals, devices, procedures, and. . .