Sound-It-By-Me Science

Source: Los Angeles Times, June 26, 2004 In "the latest instance in which the Bush administration has been accused of allowing politics to intrude into once-sacrosanct areas of scientific deliberation," the Health and Human Services Department asked the World Health Organization to allow the Department's secretary to review meeting invitations. The WHO refused, claiming that changing its long-standing practice of directly inviting individual scientists could "compromise the independence of international scientific deliberations." A spokesperson for Department Secretary Tommy Thompson said, "The World Health Organization does not know the best people to talk to, but HHS knows."