Press releases about health research findings are unfortunately common. We say unfortunately because many of them involve arcane claims that the public cannot make much sense of. But at least the scientific community can look at the research and respond. In this case, however, there was only a press release and no actual scientific reporting available for those who could understand it, a clear violation of the ethics of science and publishing. In other words, there was no way for the scientific community to see what the research actually showed, but the researchers pretended that they were providing proper scientific information. All we know is that much of what was reported was simply false. Since tobacco use is a politically charged topic, not only was the original release repeated, it was embellished with misleading health and risk information regarding tobacco use.
This page is an attempt to chronicle the results of this embarrassment for health science and collect some of the corrections. While this will do little to help the thousands of readers who were misled by the press reports, at least it will provide an archive for those who have more than a passing interest.
The press release originated with the Translational Tobacco Reduction Research Program (the Program is a joint venture of the Mary Babb Randolph Cancer Center at West Virginia University and the West Virginia University Prevention Research Center).
The original press release apparently generated no attention for a month before a spate of stories started to appear. This was presumably due to the active intervention of someone, though it is not clear who or what they did. Some of the earliest articles were the most balanced, with a tendency to become more extreme as the volume built.
Scientific journals almost always require that press releases about articles not appear until the article is actually published, not merely forthcoming. Thus, the premature press release was not only unethical in general, but probably violated the agreement the authors enter into with the journal. Our letter to the journal (which we have included in this collection) confirmed that the journal did not approve of this.
On closer inspection, we realized the original press release implies that the research was merely submitted to the journal, not even accepted for publication. This would make the situation even more egregious. The journal did not volunteer whether the paper was accepted or merely submitted, and officials at West Virginia University refused to reply to our letters (included in this collection), so we have no confirmation of this.
One of the problems with press releases, even when done properly, is that they include information that may seem meaningful to non-expert reporters and readers, but are not. In particular, this press release focused on varying nicotine levels. Many readers cannot distinguish between nicotine and tobacco. Though nicotine is the main reason people use tobacco, it is not what creates most of the health risks associated with tobacco use. But readers of a story about nicotine levels can easily be misled into thinking this has obvious implications for health, which is not true.
Those who understand the health risks from smoking know that the danger of this form of tobacco use lies in the smoke, not the nicotine and tobacco (if you are not familiar with this, please see the rest of this website). To dwell on nicotine is to lose the focus on health. If you simply measure the nicotine, and disregard the differences in the way the product is used, you make all tobacco products seem the same; equally as dangerous. So it is not surprising that this article on nicotine engendered more anti-tobacco invective, or even worse, anti-smokeless-tobacco invective. This, in turn dissuaded more smokers from trying a much safer alternative, and will probably result in needless deaths. This nicotine report resulted in the very real potential of maintaining current levels of smoking and current levels of the associated illness.
Our letter to Andrea Brunais (listed contact person at HSC News Service) and cc'd to Kimberly Horn (Director, Translational Tobacco Reduction Research Program) and James Brick (Interim Dean of the School of Medicine)
Our letter to Angie Lanham (listed contact person at West Virginia Medical Journal)
November 18
Trading Markets.com (article and response to the author)
November 19
Wboy.com (article and response)
November 20
Pittsburgh Post Gazette (article and response)
West Virginia Public Broadcasting (article and response)
November 23
Times West Virginian (article and response)
Associated Press (article)
It is not possible to respond directly to some writers such as Associated Press' Vicki Smith.
We had the sole option of responding to sources that repeated the story such as our comment .
November 27
New York Times (article and response)
The New York Times has a 150 word limit on responses which was much too limiting for a proper response to Ms. Rabin's article so we wrote this letter to her directly with our concerns. She has not responded.