UCSF report says Philip Morris influenced scientific article

[davidinalameda]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/03/07/MNGOTBLIJ31.DTL

Researchers at UCSF reviewing once-secret industry documents have detailed an elaborate effort by a leading tobacco company to raise doubts among doctors and public health officials about the well-established link between secondhand smoke and sudden infant death syndrome.

The UCSF analysis shows how, in one case, executives at Philip Morris International hired a consultant to write a scientific article on the causes of SIDS, and persuaded him to change his original conclusions so the article called into question the connection to secondhand smoke.

The article, published in 2001 in a respected medical journal, has been cited at least 19 times by other scientific papers, which meant it was taken seriously by medical researchers and, ultimately, the UCSF researchers say, was used to mislead doctors and public health officials about the risks of secondhand smoke.