TOBACCO COMPANY'S RESEARCH GRANT TO UCLA RAISES SUSPICIONS
Tobacco industry critics are accusing UCLA of conducting "secret"
research for cigarette-maker Philip Morris after the state-run
university made public a heavily censored copy of the paperwork
used to win a $6 million grant from the company.
Portions of the 200-page grant application to Philip Morris were
sent to the California Youth Advocacy Network on Friday in
response to a public records act request made in July.
The grant, which was awarded in November, pays $2 million a year
over three years to the UCLA Adolescent Smoking Cessation Center
to conduct brain scans and other studies using lab animals and
young smokers ages 14-21.
With more than half its pages either missing or redacted, the
grant application reveals little about the nature of the
research.
For example, in the section "Specific Aims," the document
released by UCLA states that "The goal of this project is to
develop a ....................."
Missing is a four- to five-line explanation of what that goal
might be.
"I am flabbergasted," said Stanton Glantz, a UCSF professor and
tobacco industry critic. "If they are so ashamed of what they
are doing that they have to hide it, they shouldn't be doing
it."
Because the grant application leaves out the names of the
researchers involved, the nature of the experiments to be
conducted, and even a description of the hypotheses being
tested, Glantz said it amounts to secret research being
conducted on behalf of Philip Morris by the public university.
