Jonathan Fishbein, a clinical research specialist at the National Institutes of Health, is appealing his firing from that organisation for what they term his “poor performance.”
Fishbein, according to the article, is in a two-year probationary period but doesn’t get into specifics about his performance to date or how long he’s been employed there. He contends that his refusal to “to overlook shortcomings in research practices, including failure to obtain proper informed consent, in NIH-sponsored studies of the drug nevirapine on African research subjects,” is the reason for his dismissal.
His lawyer, Stephen M. Kohn, has filed an appeal in response to a 6-page decision written by Judge Raphael Ben-Ami of the Merit Systems Protection Board, which argues “that Jonathan Fishbein, a clinical research specialist at the National Institutes of Health, could not seek whistle-blower protection before the board because he was employed as a “special consultant” outside regular civil service laws.”
Is Fishbein the whistle-blower behind the nevirapine scandal? If he is, he should be given a raise, not a pink slip.