{"id":7294,"date":"2017-12-15T18:03:55","date_gmt":"2017-12-15T23:03:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/?p=7294"},"modified":"2024-02-12T11:02:04","modified_gmt":"2024-02-12T16:02:04","slug":"a-parting-gift-from-dourson-a-trove-of-revealing-emails","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/2017\/12\/15\/a-parting-gift-from-dourson-a-trove-of-revealing-emails\/","title":{"rendered":"A parting gift from Dourson: A trove of revealing emails"},"content":{"rendered":"

Richard Denison, Ph.D.,\u00a0<\/em>is a Lead Senior Scientist.<\/p>\n

[Use\u00a0<\/em>this link\u00a0<\/em><\/a>to see all of our posts on Dourson.]<\/em><\/p>\n

Earlier this week, the New York Times<\/em> reported <\/a>on the withdrawal of the nomination of Michael Dourson to head the Environmental Protection Agency\u2019s (EPA) chemical safety office \u2013 which we applauded <\/a>as a win for public health.\u00a0 The Times<\/em> article mentioned and provided a link to a 400-page trove of emails <\/a>to and from Dourson that were obtained through a FOIA request filed in August by Greenpeace to the University of Cincinnati, where Dourson previously worked.<\/p>\n

The emails shine a rare spotlight on a network, of which Dourson and the American Chemistry Council (ACC) are a part, that operates largely out of public view. \u00a0It involves a coordinated effort between the chemical industry and its private and academic consultants to generate science that invariably supports the safety of the industry\u2019s chemicals, and pushes back against any regulatory and academic science that indicates otherwise.\u00a0 The emails make for very interesting reading, if you can skip through the myriad emails about scheduling calls and meetings (which make up the bulk of any of our inboxes, I suspect).<\/p>\n

To pique your interest, let me start with one email relating to Dourson\u2019s nomination.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

His nomination was publicly announced by Scott Pruitt on July 17.\u00a0 But nearly two months earlier, in an email (see page 178<\/a>) dated May 23 and marked confidential, Dourson wrote to Kimberly White at ACC to let her know of his \u201cappointment,\u201d and also alluding to the possibility (which came to pass) that he would be hired as an advisor before being confirmed:<\/p>\n

Based on the recommendation of EPA Administrator Pruitt, President Trump has appointed me as the Assistant Administrator of the Office of Safety Assessment and Pollution Prevention.\u00a0 EPA wants to get my senate confirmation scheduled before the August recess. They may also want to hire me into the Agency in July, which apparently they can do as soon as the announcement is made. The announcement is made after background checks are completed (40 days is typical). At this point, please keep news of this appointment under wraps.<\/p>\n

Now, ACC is no doubt upset by the Dourson withdrawal, having hired Dourson repeatedly to help defend its companies\u2019 chemicals and never wavering in support of his nomination.\u00a0 So it should come as no surprise that ACC is also unhappy with the Times<\/em>\u2019 release of the emails, especially given that a large fraction of them involve communications that include Dourson and ACC employees.<\/p>\n

Yesterday ACC took to its blog to object to the Times<\/em> article as \u201cmisleading.\u201d\u00a0 The only specific it takes issue with, however, is that the article \u201cpaints a dubious picture of emails between one of our employees and Dr. Michael Dourson.\u201d<\/p>\n

ACC\u2019s specific beef is that the Times<\/em> flagged emails showing that Dourson and his University colleagues had exchanged drafts of a paper they were working on with an ACC staffer.\u00a0 ACC pointed out that the staffer in that case was a co-author of the paper.\u00a0 Fair enough.<\/p>\n

But ACC\u2019s nit conveniently ignores other emails. \u00a0One chain shows direct communications between Dourson and ACC involving another paper <\/a>he co-authored that was in the final stages of publication in Dourson\u2019s go-to journal <\/a>.\u00a0 Even though no one from ACC is a co-author on this paper, Dourson\u2019s emails indicate not only that ACC had the galley proofs of the paper, but that ACC staff seemed to be the keeper of them (see chain around page 213<\/a>).<\/p>\n

ACC\u2019s blog post goes on to cite its policy that scientific conclusions and judgments drawn by outside parties ACC hires are not subject to its control.\u00a0 But that policy goes on to state that \u201cthe Council shall have the right to review such judgments and conclusions\u201d for \u201cclarification, and format and editorial comments.\u201d\u00a0 Seems like an elephant could slip through that opening.<\/p>\n

Recall that ACC recently embraced EPA Administrator Pruitt\u2019s new directive <\/a>that bars EPA-funded scientists from serving on any agency advisory panel.\u00a0 The outlandish premise behind the directive is that EPA and the extramural researchers it funds are somehow in cahoots to find problems the agency can then regulate.\u00a0 So it\u2019s worth noting that, unlike ACC\u2019s contracts, EPA grants have no allowance for EPA to pre-review or edit the papers of researchers it funds.<\/p>\n

But back to the emails, when ACC says there\u2019s no there there in them, don\u2019t believe it.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Richard Denison, Ph.D.,\u00a0is a Lead Senior Scientist. [Use\u00a0this link\u00a0to see all of our posts on Dourson.] Earlier this week, the New York Times reported on the withdrawal of the nomination of Michael Dourson to head the Environmental Protection Agency\u2019s (EPA) chemical safety office \u2013 which we applauded as a win for public health.\u00a0 The Times …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":100,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[44,56093],"tags":[39150,91812],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-7294","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-policy","category-industry-influence","tag-american-chemistry-council","tag-dourson"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7294","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/100"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7294"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7294\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12821,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7294\/revisions\/12821"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7294"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7294"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7294"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=7294"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}