How Well Do Drugs Work? Hidden Research Sometimes Makes It Hard to Tell

What's the News: Scientific publishing is how researchers get the word out about what they've learned. It's how people outside the lab learn whether a drug was safe or not, or whether a treatment had any effect. But a team of scientists looking at a sample of clinical trials funded by the US government found that 30 months after the trials were completed, more than half had not yet been published. And that means that other studies trying to assess whether those treatments are safe and effective are working with incomplete information, while the relevant trials, already paid for by the public, are gathering dust on a lab bench. How the Heck: