Submitted by Bob Burton on
Ray Moynihan reveals that while educational events have been advertised to Australian medical practitioners as being independent, behind the scenes sponsoring drug companies were being offered the chance to nominate speakers and topics relating to their drugs.
It's one of the most controversial questions today: How many Iraqis have died since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion?
That there is no definitive answer should not come as a surprise, given the chaotic situation in Iraq. Still, it's an important question to ask, for obvious humanitarian, moral and political reasons.
Theoretically, the public health surveys and polls that have been conducted in Iraq -- at great risk to the people involved -- should help inform and further the debate. But the data is complicated by different research approaches and their attendant caveats. The matter has been further confused by anemic reporting, with news articles usually framed as a "he said / she said" story, instead of an exploration and interpretation of research findings.
These are the conditions under which spin thrives: complex issues, political interests and weak reporting. So it's not too surprising that last month saw a spate of what international health researcher Dr. Richard Garfield calls "Swift Boat editorials."
Submitted by Bob Burton on
The fallout from the SourceWatch profile on the Canadian global warming skeptics group, Friends of Science (FoS), continues to grow.
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
Want to earn up to $2.4 million to produce and distribute across Iraq 12 issues of a comic book designed to "highlight the professionalism of the Iraqi Special Operations Forces (ISOF) and to enhance the public perception of the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) as a capable, well-trained, and professional fighting force"? Well, you'll have to compete with the Lincoln Group, the PR firm that previously placed U.S.
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
Ketchum, the PR firm involved in the
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
"In a move that legal experts said could present a major test of First Amendment rights in the Internet area, a federal judge in San Francisco ... ordered the disabling of a Web site devoted to disclosing confidential information." The site, Wikileaks, allows people to anonymously post documents and other information. The judge's order disabled the site's U.S.
Submitted by Bob Burton on
A Canadian global warming skeptics group, Friends of Science (FoS), is facing several investigations into a radio advertising blitz it ran in the 2006 election campaign, which criticized the then-Liberal government's support for cutting greenhouse gas emissions. Funding for FoS came in part from a University of Calgary trust account.
Submitted by Judith Siers-Poisson on
French researchers are concerned that consumer demand for hybrid cars, fueled by advertising and PR, is slowing down the development of genuinely sustainable green auto technologies.
A February 9 Los Angeles Times article about University of California, Los Angeles professor Edythe London taking a $6 million grant from Philip Morris to study the brains of child smokers and monkeys addicted to nicotine once again raises questions about the appropriateness of university researchers accepting tobacco industry funding. Philip Morris denied that they have a stake in this particular project, but the denial had little credibility since the company no doubt will benefit from understanding more about youth smoking and nicotine addiction. After all, the future of their business depends on these two topics. Still, we wonder why any person curious enough to be engaged in scientific research isn't also curious enough to find out what's in it for Philip Morris before they accept the funds? These days, the answer is as close as your computer.
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
Corporate sponsors of this summer's Beijing Olympics Games are increasingly nervous.
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