We have become highly sensitized to the question of conflict of interest in healthcare—and rightly so. But the dominant narrative seems to be one-sided: doctors and scientists getting personally paid by industry sponsors and letting those payments color their judgment, consciously or unconsciously.

Personal financial conflict of interest is certainly an important and pervasive problem, but there are many aspects of COI that get less attention and may be equally harmful to society at large. To discuss this topic, our own Anish Koka engages Michel Accad in a lively discussion that tries to probe the topic in depth, even when such probing reveals uncomfortable truths.