Meanwhile, the study authors responded to the notice explaining that the issues raised in the retraction notice were actually addressed during the peer review process. Then they proceeded to offer further details when the journal sent the retraction notice.
The said authors are all employees of Pinney Associates, a consulting firm that provides services to Juul Labs Inc., amongst others. More importantly Juul Labs funded the research and reviewed and provided comments on a draft manuscript. However the retraction notice does not refer to that conflict of interest.
The letter to the editor, which was shared with the study authors by Lorena Verduci, an editor of BMC Public Health, mentioned Juul’s support for the article. It added that the analysis assumed that the prevalence of e-cigarette use in the US was zero in 2010 and rose in a linear fashion until a CDC survey began gathering data on usage in 2014.
The letter said that this filling in linear data points between 2010 and 2014 was “questionable,” and that findings from an additional analysis that left out those filled-in values “are hidden in the manuscript.” The letter also said that most of the estimated associations found in the paper’s supplementary materials were “no longer statistically significant” in that analysis.
Empty accusations
Lead study author Floe Foxon, sent the authors’ response on June 12th. This explained that sensitivity tests they performed using 2009 and 2011 as alternative cutoff years, support the findings of the main analysis. The paper’s peer review record, which is available online, indicates that the authors added those sensitivity tests in a revision responding to reviewer feedback.
The authors also wrote that the results of the main analyses were significant for the younger adult and male cohorts in these sensitivity tests, and given that these were the cohorts with the highest vape use prevalence, they were the most relevant to the research question. They added that contrary to the letter’s claims that the results were not mentioned in text, the findings from this analysis were actually reported in the Results section of the manuscript under ‘Sensitivity test results.’ “Thus, the allegation in the Letter that we “directed attention elsewhere” is simply untrue,” concluded the authors.
Lies costing lives
This event is just but one example of the widespread bias against vaping. Renowned international public health experts have been denouncing the bias and current misinformation circulating against and about safer nicotine alternatives. Earlier this year, Director of the Tobacco Dependence Research Unit at Wolfson Institute of Public Health, Queen Mary University of London, Prof. Peter Hajek, said that while believing they are fighting the right cause, some anti-nicotine campaigners cause a lot of damage by spreading lies. They try to illicit fear by exaggerating the dangers of nicotine with serious health claims such as that nicotine is toxic for the brain.
Hayek highlighted that in fact there is no clear scientific evidence to support this claim. He added that on the contrary, “smoking-related cancer, heart disease and lung disease will eventually disappear as smoking is made obsolete by much less risky nicotine products that do not include combustion”.
Prof. Gerry Stimson, a social scientist from Britain, the nation which remains a leader in tobacco harm reduction (THR), emphasised that while cigarettes are a harmful delivery mechanism for nicotine, nicotine itself doesn’t cause tobacco-related diseases.
In fact, science has indicted that not only is the stimulant not all that bad, but also that it has some powerful medicinal properties. A panel discussion at this year’s Global Forum on Nicotine (GFN23) titled “The changing face of nicotine” delved into how misunderstood nicotine is. Dr Paul Newhouse, a psychiatrist and physician scientist, explained that as a stimulant, nicotine activates the brain receptors involved in mood regulation. This can be beneficial for some and may lead to improved brain function in some.
GP and educator Dr Carolyn Beaumont, discussed nicotine from the context of it being considered addictive. She said that the term “addiction” is a strong term and carries with it a lot of negative connotations. She added that clearly these are derived from the fact that nicotine is considered the addictive component in cigarettes. However, she concluded, while cigarettes are known to be deadly, one must bear in mind that nicotine on its own is harmless.
Public Health Expert Uncovers the Biases of Some Tobacco Researchers
