Science Fictions: How Fraud, Bias, Negligence, and Hype Undermine the Search for Truth

by Stuart Ritchie

What led to such a drawn-out process, where even the horrific, painful deaths of multiple patients hadn’t moved the university to fire, or even censure, the man responsible? Indeed, what led to the university lashing out against the very people who blew the whistle on the falsified results?33 Macchiarini clearly used his ‘breakthrough’ operations to burnish his reputation and fame. But he was also an asset to the Karolinska Institute and its planned international expansion. It has been suggested that the university’s association with the superstar surgeon helped to grease the wheels of its new regenerative medicine centre that was being set up in Hong Kong.34 Sheer panic and embarrassment were likely also a factor in their wanting to cover up the case: a university with as high a standing as the Karolinska would hardly be keen to admit to themselves, let alone the public, that they’d let a lethally dangerous fraudster loose on vulnerable patients.