Court rejects defamation claim by Alzheimer's treatment pioneer

Xinhua

A Shanghai court has dismissed a defamation claim by a top local scientist dedicated to the development of China's first approved drug for Alzheimer's treatment.

The Pudong New Area People's Court rejected the petition by Geng Meiyu, a researcher of the Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica, who had asked Rao Yi, president of Capital Medical University, to apologize publicly for "damaging her reputation."

Geng had sought personal apologies from Rao on his personal WeChat account as well as several leading domestic newspapers for half a month.

However, the court ruled that "proper academic arguments and criticisms should be allowed for the development of the medical sector."

The lawsuit between the country's two top medical scientists has attracted wide public attention because the dispute focused on a major breakthrough in China's medical development in recent decades.

Geng from the local institute under the Chinese Academy of Sciences has been dedicated to the development of GV-971 since 1997. The National Medical Products Administration approved sales of the drug – the first for Alzheimer's treatment to be approved in 17 years – last year.

The results of the mechanism of action study were published in the international journal Cell Research in September 2019. It said that the drug, extracted from brown algae, works by modifying gut bacteria to ultimately reduce brain inflammation in mice that were genetically engineered to have the disease.

Rao initially published articles against Geng's research on several WeChat groups of the nation's leading medical scientists in November 2019. He claimed Geng's research results of GV-971 must be fake and asked the National Natural Science Foundation of China to launch an investigation.

Rao later published his views against Geng's research on Cell Research in July 2020, saying Geng's article failed to quote previous research results on GV-971, which showed huge differences on the medicine's effects and mechanism.

Geng replied on the same journal a week later, arguing that previous studies were irrelevant to Alzheimer's treatment and meaningless to be mentioned in her article.

The Ministry of Science and Technology announced after an investigation of five articles by Geng that "no academic fraud was detected, but some photos were misused." Geng and the co-authors should be educated, the ministry said in the statement in January 2021, reminded them of scientific integrity.

The Pudong court said no legal restriction or interference should be imposed on medical research. The defendant has published scientific proof to support his claims and had no intention of deliberately damaging Geng's reputation, it ruled.

"The judicial system should create a loose environment for academic criticism and encourage academic arguments," the court concluded.