You are here

Responses

Article menu

Download PDFPDF

Perspective
What if… your research is suddenly affiliated with a tobacco manufacturing company?
Compose a Response to This Article
Compose Response

More information about text formats

Plain text

  • No HTML tags allowed.
  • Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
Author Information
First or given name, e.g. 'Peter'.
Your last, or family, name, e.g. 'MacMoody'.
Your email address, e.g. higgs-boson@gmail.com
Your role and/or occupation, e.g. 'Orthopedic Surgeon'.
Your organization or institution (if applicable), e.g. 'Royal Free Hospital'.
Statement of Competing Interests

PLEASE NOTE:

  • A rapid response is a moderated but not peer reviewed online response to a published article in a BMJ journal; it will not receive a DOI and will not be indexed unless it is also republished as a Letter, Correspondence or as other content. Find out more about rapid responses.
  • We intend to post all responses which are approved by the Editor, within 14 days (BMJ Journals) or 24 hours (The BMJ), however timeframes cannot be guaranteed. Responses must comply with our requirements and should contribute substantially to the topic, but it is at our absolute discretion whether we publish a response, and we reserve the right to edit or remove responses before and after publication and also republish some or all in other BMJ publications, including third party local editions in other countries and languages
  • Our requirements are stated in our rapid response terms and conditions and must be read. These include ensuring that: i) you do not include any illustrative content including tables and graphs, ii) you do not include any information that includes specifics about any patients,iii) you do not include any original data, unless it has already been published in a peer reviewed journal and you have included a reference, iv) your response is lawful, not defamatory, original and accurate, v) you declare any competing interests, vi) you understand that your name and other personal details set out in our rapid response terms and conditions will be published with any responses we publish and vii) you understand that once a response is published, we may continue to publish your response and/or edit or remove it in the future.
  • By submitting this rapid response you are agreeing to our terms and conditions for rapid responses and understand that your personal data will be processed in accordance with those terms and our privacy notice.
CAPTCHA
This question is for testing whether or not you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.

Vertical Tabs

Other responses

Jump to comment:

  • Published on: 17 April 2024
    Solutions to tobacco industry influence on science need to address the whole system of science
    • Tess Legg, Research Associate University of Bath
    • Other Contributors:
      • Alice Fabbri, Lecturer

    Van den Bosch et al. (2024) carefully outline their reflections on Philip Morris International’s (PMI) 2021 takeover of Vectura Group. We thank the authors for opening the conversation on this important issue and sympathise about the difficult position they were left in when Vectura’s board agreed to PMI’s acquisition. We would like to offer some additional food for thought on this topic stemming from our own work.

    The Science for Profit Model (Legg et al., 2021a) demonstrates how corporations across diverse industries seek to influence all aspects of science – what is researched, how research is conducted, disseminated and interpreted, and whether and how it is used in policy and practice. Corporate sectors including tobacco, pharmaceuticals, alcohol, fossil fuels and gambling do this in remarkably similar ways, skewing whole evidence bases in industry’s favour – weakening regulation, preventing litigation and maximising product sales.

    Certain aspects of this influence are particularly pertinent here. Firstly, despite Vectura assuring the researchers their work would remain independent, the resulting science can still further PMI’s objectives. Research that deflects attention from corporate harms or promotes interventions that minimise damage to product sales is not necessarily “contaminated” but nonetheless benefits the industry funder by driving research agendas away from topics which would impact industry negatively (Legg et al., 2021a, Fabbri et al., 20...

    Show More
    Conflict of Interest:
    None declared.