Back in 2010, California's Tobacco-Related Disease Research Program (TRDRP) - an organisation which despises tobacco, as the name suggests - decided that a new lie was required, so dangled 3.75 million carrots in front of junk scientists everywhere.
TRDRP Call for Applications
Request for Proposals for TRDRP Initiative on Thirdhand Smoke and Cigarette Butts
The Tobacco-Related Disease Research Program (TRDRP) announces a Request for Proposals (RFP) to undertake studies on Thirdhand Smoke and Cigarette Butt Waste, under a new initiative.
Approximately $3.75 million is expected to be available for this RFP.Of course, junk scientists will say anything you like for $3.75 million (eh, Anna?), and it was clear what results the TRDRP were looking for, so prospective grantees had to be equally clear about what the TRDRP would get for its money.
One such lucky winner - as I reported at the time - was University of California Riverside.
[Manuela] Martins-Green will study the effects of this kind of smoke exposure on skin biology and wound healing. The two-year $250,000 grant will support one graduate student and one postdoctoral scholar. “I am expecting to find that prolonged exposure to third-hand smoke will affect the ability of the skin to protect us from environmental exposures,” she said. “I also expect that, when injured, the skin will not heal normally and could even result in wounds that become chronic.”So, Manuela already knew what her report was going to say before she embarked upon it. It's kind of a prerequisite in tobacco control; if your study is impartial it might come up with the wrong results, you see, and would have to be buried. And what a waste of TRDRP's money that would be!
What's more, the TRDRP grant application page shows that Manuela didn't only pre-commit to a result, she also knew exactly what her post-'research' conclusions would be.
These studies will lend themselves to preparation of educational materials that can be provided to adults who smoke to raise their awareness of the impact that their smoking can have on their children and elderly parents. Furthermore, these studies will also help adult smokers understand that their family members are severely affected if they undergo surgery and return to a THS-polluted environment because their healing process will be not only be altered but will also be significantly delayed. Finally, the proposed work will benefit the public by providing a better understanding of the cause of impaired healing among individuals who are constantly exposed to Third Hand Smoke, i.e. smokers themselves, children and elderly parents in households of smokers, waiters and waitresses in bars and housekeepers in hotels or houses of smokers.Scroll on to the present day and whaddya know!
Researchers at the University of California, Riverside, found that thirdhand smoke leads to damage to organs in mice, as well as increased wound healing time.So there you have it, bought and paid for bullshit. From drawing board to mass reproduction by lazy journalists worldwide, how a tobacco control lie is born and travels the globe before the truth can get its Doc Martens on.
The exact same process has been employed in the past to conjure up the passive smoking myth, and is currently being used to create lies about obesity, alcohol, salt, sugar, e-cigs and any other public health hobby horse. Mostly using your taxes to do so.
Yet it is only tobacco-funded research which is too corrupt to be published? You've got to be kidding!
If this is the trustworthiness of 'peer-reviewed science', I suggest that anything published by academic journals should be treated as if you'd just read it in the Beano.
