Sepsis is a very serious illness — of the million Americans who get the disease each year, up to 30 percent will die. A large, National Institutes of Health (NIH)-funded government trial of sepsis treatments, called Clovers, is currently under attack. According to the New York Times, "In a letter to the federal Office for Human Research Protection, representatives of Public Citizen’s Health Research Group compared the study, called Clovers, to 'an experiment that would be conducted on laboratory animals.” The Times recounts, "At issue is whether patients participating in Clovers are being given treatment that deviates from usual care — so much so that lives may be endangered by the research. Participants are only enrolled for 24 hours, but the first hours of treatment are critical for survival. . . . Scientists leading the study note that treatment is not hard and fast, and insist that all participants are getting medical care that 'falls within the range of usual care.'” The Consortium is nationally recognized for its work on patient rights and research ethics in clinical trials; among our contributions are major, national conferences bringing together top policymakers, scholars and researchers to grapple with thorny issues of consent, capacity and conflicts of interest. To learn more and view videos from these conferences, visit our YouTube channel.