Scientists

Anti-Tobacco Researchers

[* Denotes documented RWJF funding]

RWJF: Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is the biggest single shareholder in Nicotine Replacement Therapy (NRT) producer Johnson&Johnson and began its massive funding of tobacco control in the U.S. in 1991, the same year the FDA approved the nicotine patch as a prescription drug.

• Ahluwalia, Jasjit*

Dept of Preventive Medicine and Dept. of Internal Medicine, School of Medicine, University of Kansas, Kansas City. RWJF Generalist Physician Faculty Scholars Award and recipient of honoraria and grant support from Glaxo Wellcome (makers of Zyban), SmithKline Beecham (makers of Nicorette and Nicoderm) AND Johnson & Johnson’s McNeil Consumer Products (makers of Nicotrol and other cessation products). Chair of Nominations Committee for Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco [SRNT].

• Altman, David*

At Bowman Grey School of Medicine, Department of Public Health in Winston-Salem, NC. Served as a consultant and helped administer RWJF’s “Tobacco Policy Research & Evaluation Program.”

• Arno, Peter S.*

Associate Professor, Dept. of Epidemiology and Social Medicine, Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx. Listed in RWJF’s media guide for “Ethical, social and Public Health Implications of Regulating Tobacco,” which was a “study” of the tobacco industry’s influence in weakening anti-tobacco legislation and litigation (and even the 60 Minutes Wigand show). Arno’s study blames tobacco industry campaign funding.

• Benowitz, Neal

Prof. of medicine, UC San Francisco. A reviewer for Tobacco Control. A member discussion group chair for Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco [SRNT].

• Bero, Lisa*

Assistant Professor, Institute for Health Policy Studies, UC San Francisco. A colleague of and sometimes co-publisher with Stanton Glantz. Listed in RWJF media guide for “Quality of Research on Environmental Tobacco Smoke by Different Sponsors.”

Bero has been given substantial RWJF money for this project, the results of which were published in JAMA in l999. Basically the “study” says any studies conducted with tobacco funding are bad, but those conducted with other funding (ostensibly including pharmaceutical money from RWJF) are good. A reviewer for Tobacco Control.

• Biener, Lois*

Senior Research Fellow, University of Massachusetts at Boston Center for Survey Research, Boston MA. Listed as a media contact in RWJF’s guide for “Survey on Responses to the Massachusetts Tobacco Control Program.” The survey would, among other things, “determine the characteristics of smokers who are most responsive to media messages and to determine which segments of the population are most likely to adopt anti-tobacco stances.” Biener received $220,152 from RWJF for that “study.” She is a frequent RWJF grantee who often publishes journal articles with other RWJF grantees.

• Burns, David*

Prof. of Medicine, UC San Diego. Among RWJF-funded projects is an article on the tobacco settlement in Tobacco Control [“What Should Be the Elements of Any Settlement With the Tobacco Industry?” 6(1):1-4, l997] A former vice president of California Nonsmokers’ Rights Foundation in l983 (along with Virginia Ernster) when co-founder Stanton Glantz was president of the organization, which later became Americans for Nonsmokers’ Rights.

• Califano, Joseph*

President and founder of the Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse [CASA] at Columbia University, which has received primary and massive funding from RWJF. Califano was Jimmy Carter’s Secretary of Health, Education & Welfare, l977-79. An Honorary Board member of Americans for Nonsmokers’ Rights Foundation.

• Chaloupka, Frank*

Assoc. Prof., economics dept., University of Illinois at Chicago; Faculty Research Fellow, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc., North Aurora, Illinois. Very heavily funded by RWJF and listed as media contact in RWJF guide for “Tobacco Prices, Restrictions, and Use Among Youth.” Chaloupka’ study, which was published by none other than the National Bureau of Economic Research, according to a 7/19/96 Tobacco-Free Kids press release for it, found that a 75-cent per pack increase in price would have cut overall youth smoking in half during the l992-l994 Monitoring the Future Youth Survey years. Wherever there is talk of raising tobacco and alcohol taxes, there is Frank Chaloupka to generate the figures.

Chaloupka is a scientific core group member of RWJF’s Research Network on the Etiology of Tobacco Dependence [TERN]. He also wrote Chp. 6 [“Economic Interventions”] for the l998 S.G.’s report, “The Context for Change: The Efficacy of Interventions for Smoking Prevention and Control,” and “Effect of Tobacco Taxation” for the l994 S.G.’s report. Chaloupka has received funding not only from RWJF, but also from the NCI (for the ASSIST program and other tobacco control projects), from NIDA, from SAMHA, from the CDC, from the ACS, and from the ALA. The Monitoring the Future Youth Survey (on tobacco, alcohol and drug use) is funded by RWJF. He lists himself as a consultant to the World Bank’s Human Development Department (l997- ), the American Cancer Society’s Tobacco Tax Policy Project (l996 - ), the National Cancer Institute (1991- ), the RWJF (l993 - ), Audits & Surveys (l993 - ), the CDC’s Office on Smoking and Health (l993 - ) and the EPA, Indoor Air Division (l994-95).

With Kenneth Warner and others, he wrote “Criteria for Determining an Optimal Cigarette Tax,” published in Tobacco Control in l995 [Vol. 4, No. 4, pp. 380-386]. He is also a

Reviewer for and Associate Editor of (“Economics of tobacco use, tobacco related disease, and tobacco control”) Tobacco Control, and he is a member of the Illinois Coalition Against Tobacco, (coalition of ACS, ALA, AHA and others) which received a RWJF grant of $1 million in l994.

• Clayton, Richard*

Director, Center for Prevention Research, University of Kentucky. Program Director for RWJF’s Research Network on the Etiology of Tobacco Dependence. Network chair of RWJF’s TERN [Tobacco Etiology Research Network]. Clayton has suggested that schools go beyond health messages to “environmental strategies.” “For instance, he says, principals could pretend the faculty restrooms are broken, and force teachers to share the students’ restrooms, which would mean fewer kids sneaking in there to smoke” [“The Rehooked Generation: How Do We Help Them Stop?”, by David Ansley, onhealth.com, 11/19/98]

• Cummings, K. Michael*

Sr. Research Scientist, Dept. of Cancer Control & Epidemiology, Roswell Park Cancer Institute, Buffalo NY. Also “Research Scientist” with Health Research, Inc. of Buffalo. Listed in RWJF’s media guide for his “Assessment of the Effects of New York City’s Smoke-Free Restaurant Law on Sales and Consumer Attitudes and Behavior,” which would study tax receipt data to determine the economic impact of the ban and would conduct a survey to gauge consumers’ and restaurant owners’ response to the law and determine steps needed for them to comply with the law. Results were expected in l998. Cummings received $183,133 from RWJF for this “study.”

Cummings is heavily funded by RWJF and has even co-authored an article with RWJF’s C. Tracy Orleans, which was published in the Nov/Dec l999 issue of the American Journal of Health Promotion. The article focused heavily on cessation treatments and products and advocated more research on cessation as well as continued tobacco tax increases, counter advertising, and anti-tobacco “advocacy” (lobbying). Cummings, has written the same message before (i.e. in his RWJF-funded “Environmental and Policy Influences on Tobacco Use,” published in the Winter l998 issue of Tobacco Control, for which he got a cool $126,593 from RWJF).

• Curry, Susan J*

Scientific Investigator, Center for Health Studies, Group Health Cooperative of Puget Sound, WA. The cooperative has received RWJF funding for “studying” tobacco cessation/control in HMOs. She is listed in the RWJF media guide for her project to examine the cost-effectiveness for HMOs to cover the cost of cessation programs [“Impact of Co-Payments on Use of Smoking Cessation Services in an HMO”].

• Daynard, Richard*

President, Tobacco Control Resource Center, Inc., and Chair, Tobacco Products Liability Project, Northeastern University Law School, Boston Mass. Editor of the Tobacco Products Litigation Reporter. He has advised or consulted with most plaintiff attorneys suing tobacco companies over the years and consulted with state attorneys general and private attorneys in the state lawsuits against the tobacco industry, and has sued some of the private attorneys for a share of the money, though he and his TCRC received a $1.1 million grant from the National Cancer Institute to assist with those lawsuits (and others). He and TPLP have also received funding from the CDC for their hosting of annual conferences for anti-tobacco litigators

Daynard has also received a hundreds of thousands of dollars in RWJF grants and is listed in RWJF’s media guide for his RWJF-funded study, “Analysis of the Implications of the Americans With Disabilities Act for Environmental Tobacco Smoke Policy” (or how to use the ADA to force tobacco ban legislation and also conduct litigation). Associate editor for “Litigation” and reviewer for Tobacco Control. Sat on the RWJF-funded Koop/Kessler Advisory Committee on Tobacco Policy and Public Health. Though he is not an engineer and has no credentials, he has managed to become a voting member of and advisor to ASHRAE [American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air Conditioning Engineers]. Advisor to WHO. President GASP Massachusetts since l983. Board of Directors for STAT [Stop Teenage Addiction to Tobacco] Board of Directors American Nonsmokers’ Rights (and ANRF).

• DiFranza, Joseph*

Prof. Dept. of family and community medicine, University of Massachusetts (Worcester, Mass). Reviewer for Tobacco Control. He also sat on the Special Review Committee, which approved the NCI grant to Richard Daynard to assist in anti-tobacco litigation. With funding from RWJF DiFranza investigated state compliance with a 1992 law [the Synar Regulation] cracking down on tobacco sales to youth. DiFranza found most states and even the Department of Health and Human Services in violation of the statutory requirements of the law [the results of his police work were published in his article in the Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine in Oct. l999].

• Ernster, Virginia

Prof. of epidemiology, Dept. of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Medicine, UC San Francisco. Tobacco advertising and women. A Vice President of California Nonsmokers’ Rights Foundation in 1983 (along with David Burns), when Stanton Glantz was President of the organization, which later became ANRF. Ernster was given a CA Prop 99 grant of $528,147 to study “Cigarette Smoking & Facial Wrinkling” [Annual Report to the State of California Legislature l993, Univ. of California, “Tobacco-Related Disease Research Program”].

• Fiore, Michael*

Director, Center for Tobacco Research and Intervention, University of Wisconsin Medical School (Madison, WI). One of principal investigators with RWJF/NCI/NIDA $14.5 million (RWJF provided $14 million of the total) Transdisciplinary Tobacco Use Research Centers. Has received funding from Glaxo Wellcome and RWJF. His recent Preventive Medicine article, “Cost-Benefit Analysis of Sustained-Release Bupropion, Nicotine Patch or Both for Smoking Cessation” [Mar 2000, Vol. 30, No. 3], which found that bupropion [Zyban] was a more cost-beneficial smoking cessation intervention than the nicotine patch was funded by Glaxo Wellcome, makers of Zyban.

• Flora, Jane A.*

Associate Director, Stanford Center for Research in Disease Prevention, Stanford Univ. School of Medicine. Listed in RWJF media guide for study, “Advertising/Promotion Influences on Adolescent Perceptions of Smoking.” More in the “advertising, promotional items, and movies cause kids to smoke” vein

• Galanter, Marc*

Director, Institute for Legal Studies, University of Wisconsin-Madison Law School. Received a $288,967 RWJF grant in l994 for “Assessing the Potential Contribution of Lawsuits in Controlling Tobacco Risks.”

• Garner, Don*

Professor of Law, Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, School of Law. Listed on RWJF’s media guide and funded by RWJF to write a “Model Municipal Ordinance Prohibiting Cigarette Billboards.” Garner helped cities draft legislation to ban tobacco billboards and restrict tobacco ad placement. The “model” ordinance was mailed to 1000 state municipalities and “citizens groups.” Garner is also a reviewer for Tobacco Control. Interestingly, back in l991, prior to getting RWJF funding, Garner said job discrimination against smokers was an unfair labor practice: “‘ More and more, smokers [comprise] minorities, women and the poor,’ he said. ‘To take job opportunities away from a population that needs more job opportunities strikes me as an unfair labor practice.’” And he continued in that vein talking about employers dictating the private but unhealthy behavioral choices of employees: “It’s in a sense Nazi-like in its extreme desire for purity.... Or do you recognize we all sin, all fall short of the glory of God, and take a softer approach?” [“Bosses Snoop into Private Lives, Alan Sipress, Pittsburgh Press, 4/7/91].

• Giovino, Gary

CDC’s Office on Smoking and Health chief of epidemiology until l999. Now at Roswell Park in Buffalo, he is a colleague of Michael Cummings. An executive officer of Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco [SRNT] and RWJF’s Tobacco Etiology Research Network [TERN]. A Senior Editor of Tobacco Control.

• Goldstein, Adam*

Clinical Asst. Professor, Department of Family Medicine, UNC Chapel Hill. Listed as a contact in RWJF’s media guide for “Attitudes of State Legislators Toward Tobacco and Tobacco Control Policies.”

• Grossman, Michael*

Prof. of Economics, City University of New York Graduate School and Research Associate and Program Director of Health Economics Research, National Bureau of Economic Research. A close professional associate of Frank Chaloupka with whom he has conducted numerous studies on tobacco and alcohol taxes and with whom he has published many tobacco-related articles and op-eds and letters to the editor, the subject of which is almost always a call for higher tobacco taxes. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, Institute of Medicine (l990- ).

• Hatsukami, Dorothy*

Prof., Dept. of Psychiatry and Director of the Tobacco Research Program at the University of Minnesota. One of researchers funded by RWJF/NCI/NIDA Transdisciplinary Tobacco Use Research Centers. President of Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco [SRNT].

• Henningfield, Jack*

Former Chief, clinical pharmacology for the National Institute on Drug Abuse [NIDA]. Now an Assoc. Prof. of behavioral biology at Johns Hopkins University Medical School and Vice-Pres. for Research and Health Policy at Pinney Associates (Bethesda, MD), which does consulting and research and health policy. Associate editor for “Addiction and pharmacology” and a reviewer for Tobacco Control. An officer and past president of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco [SRNT], and a core member of RWJF’s Tobacco Etiology Research Network [TERN].

• Hughes, John

Prof. of psychiatry, psychology and family practice, University of Vermont, Dept. of Psychiatry. Cessation [Columbia Journalism Review media handbook says his specialty is “nicotine withdrawal, drug therapies and patches to help people quit smoking.”]. Member of and a spokesman for SRNT [Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco]

• Keeler, Theodore*

Professor, University of California at Berkeley. Listed in RWJF media guide for “Analysis of Ways to Enhance Smoking Cessation and Deterrence Programs Directed at Individuals,” which investigated the effect of government-imposed restrictions on the marketing and availability of smoking cessation aides such as the patch and gum. The study findings were expected in the fall of l998. [And subsequently the FDA approved J&J’s Nicotrol for over-the-counter sale in record time, ahead of its competitors’ products.]

• Lando, Harry

Professor, division of epidemiology, University of Minnesota. Cessation. A reviewer for Tobacco Control.

• Lichtenstein, Edward

Researcher, Oregon Research Institute (Eugene, OR). Field is smoking cessation clinics and the role of doctors in cessation. A reviewer for Tobacco Control.

• Miller, Leonard S.*

Professor, UC Berkeley, School of Social Welfare. Listed in RWJF media guide for a study entitled, “Determining Current Costs of Cigarette Smoking,” which estimated the smoking-attributable Medicaid expenditures in all 50 states (in preparation for state suits?). Completed in March l996, the “study” found that the state expenditures averaged about 5.64 percent of the state Medicaid budgets from l980 to l993.

• Ockene, Judith

Director, Dept. of Preventive and Behavioral Medicine, University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester, Mass, which has received many RWJF grants. An executive officer of Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco [SRNT]. Sat on the federal Interagency Committee on Smoking and Health from its first official meetings in l986 through l988.

• Pope, Gregory*

Center for Health Economics Research, Inc., Waltham, MA. Listed in RWJF media guide for “Study of the Adoption and Economic Effects of Smoke-free Restaurant Ordinances in Massachusetts.” Results were expected in early l997.

• Rabin, Robert*

Professor of law at Stanford University Law School. Served as Senior Consultant for RWJF’s “Tobacco and substance abuse policy program.”

• Rigotti, Nancy*

Founder and Director of Tobacco Research and Treatment Center, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston MA. A scientific editor for the l989 S.G.’s report on tobacco, for which Kenneth Warner was the Chief Scientific Editor. Listed in RWJF media guide for RWJF grant on “Does Active Enforcement of Tobacco Sales Laws Reduce Adolescents’ Smoking?” Has done a number of studies funded by RWJF, including: “Impediments to the enforcement of youth access laws” [with Joseph DiFranza, Tobacco Control, l999 Summer;8(2):152-5]. Also does studies and writes articles such as the Mass. ACS and NCI-funded “The use of nicotine-replacement therapy by hospitalized smokers” [Rigotti, Arnsten J, McKool K, Wood-Reid K, et al, American Journal of Preventive Medicine, Nov 1999;17(4),255-259] supporting use of pharmaceutical cessation products. Was a member of a research team at the Institute for the Study of Smoking, Behavior and Policy at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government for five years in the 80s until the Institute closed in 1990. With regard to underage smoking: “Since prevention isn’t working, we need to focus on cessation,” [“The Rehooked Generation: How Do We Help Them Stop?” by David Ansley, onhealth.com, 11/19/98]. An executive officer of SRNT.

• Samet, Jonathan - Chair, Dept. of Epidemiology, Johns Hopkins School of Public Health. Funded by SmithKline Beecham in carrying out China’s Third National Survey on Smoking, which was presented at the 10th World Conference on Smoking and Health at Beijing in August l997. SmithKline Beecham, world’s leading marketer of smoking cessation products and programs, also funded the Johns Hopkins Institute for Global Tobacco Control in the School of Public Health (launched 5/29/98). Samet was one of the consulting editors for the l986 Surgeon General’s report [health effects of ETS] released by C. Everett Koop. He is an Associate Editor for “Health effects of tobacco use” and a reviewer for Tobacco Control.
• Shiffman, Saul*

Prof. of psychology, smoking research group, University of Pittsburgh. Is a member of RWJF’s TERN [Tobacco Etiology Research Network] and the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco [SRNT].

• Siegel, Michael

Research Associate, Social and Behavioral Sciences Department, Boston University School of Public Health. He spent two years at the CDC’s Office on Smoking and Health, and prior to that was Preventive Medicine resident at UC Berkeley. Member of the Board of Directors of American Nonsmokers’ Rights Foundation until he resigned early in 2000, possibly because of the public emergence of the news of ANR’s tax-funded “enemies” list, though his resignation came immediately after he was challenged over a false accusation against Robert Levy of the Cato Institute which appeared in an article (signed by Siegel) on ANR’s website. The article itself proposed using smears to deflate scientific challenges to anti-tobacco junk science rather than debating on scientific grounds. A reviewer for Tobacco Control, Siegel has also worked with Lois Biener to do studies, which support Massachusetts’ heavily funded anti-tobacco program, which is headed by Greg Connolly.

He now runs a critical blog in which he accuses TC going way too far.

• Sitzer, Maxine

Prof. Dept. of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Johns Hopkins Univ. School of Medicine. Committee Chair, Society of Research on Nicotine and Tobacco (Scientific Liaison: Public Policy Council).

• Slade, John*

Assoc. Prof. Dept of Med., Univ. of Medicine & Dentistry of New Jersey, Robert Wood Johnson Medical School (St. Peter’s Medical Center). Slade has been a key organizer of an annual addiction medicine conference, and has promoted FDA regulation of tobacco since the late 80s. He has received numerous RWJF grants and co-edited a book with RWJF’s C. Tracy Orleans [“Nicotine Addiction,” NY: Oxford University Press, l993]. Is listed in RWJF’s media guide for his “Analysis of Whether Tobacco Meets the Legal Definition of a Drug,” which Slade says it does. The analysis was submitted to the FDA in l996 on behalf of the American Society of Addiction Medicine. Slade is also an Associate Editor, “Legislation and regulation” and reviewer for Tobacco Control.

• Thun, Michael

American Cancer Society vice president for Epidemiology and Surveillance Research. A reviewer for Tobacco Control

• Warner, Kenneth*

Prof. and Chair, Dept. of Public Health Policy and Administration, Univ. of Michigan at Ann Arbor. Warner is a reviewer for Tobacco Control and has received enormous RWJF funding and is listed in RWJF media guide for his study, “The Employment Implications of Declining Tobacco Product Sales for the Regional Economies of the U.S.” Essentially, the study says that there won’t be economic loss in most states if tobacco goes under because people will spend the money on other things. It acknowledges that the 6 major tobacco-producing states would be affected, but that it wouldn’t be as bad as expected and the gains in other states would be worth the loss in the Southeast. Warner has continually worked on studies, which minimize the economic effects of tobacco bans and declining tobacco sales. The most recent was in the Spring 2000 issue of Tobacco Control [“The economics of tobacco: myths and realities,” 9:78-89]. It was funded by the RWJF and Warner thanks Frank Chaloupka and Gary Giovino for their assistance.

In addition to multiple grants, Warner heads one of RWJF’s continuing programs and is an apparently tireless flack for raising prices and for widespread use of cessation products (including medical insurance coverage of them). He was quoted in the L.A. Times Washington Edition [“Tobacco Ads’ Impact Debatable, Except to Some Lawmakers,” Alissa Rubin, 3/19/98]: “Increasing the price of cigarettes--a lot--is far and away the most important thing we can do to reduce youth smoking.” His RWJF-funded study on the “Cost Effectiveness of Smoking Cessation Therapies: Interpretation of the Evidence and Implications for Coverage,” appeared in Pharmaco-Economics in l997 [11(6):538-549]. Another RWJF-funded study touting nicotine replacement products by Warner, John Slade (another RWJF grantee) and David Sweanor of the Canadian Nonsmokers’ Rights Association appeared in JAMA in l997 [“The emerging market for long-term nicotine maintenance,” 278( 13):1087-1092]. The article depicted the tobacco industry as the bad guys who were trying to maintain nicotine dependence and the pharmaceutical industry as the good guys who were delivering nicotine therapeutically to help people quit smoking or who would vie with the tobacco industry for the long-term nicotine maintenance market.

Warner is one of the 11 members of the board of the American Legacy Foundation, along with RWJF CEO Steven Schroeder, which essentially means RWJF gets two votes on every issue and that RWJF has VERY heavy input in policy decisions. Will ALF become a $200 million vehicle for promoting Johnson & Johnson’s (and other pharmaceutical companies’) cessation products?