OT: Corruption at Harvard - RE: Fluoride (yikesssss when will it end?????????)

[Guest guest]

Further to the earlier note " _Harvard Fluoride Cancer Scandal_

(http://www.newmediaexplorer.org/chris/2006/08/27/harvard_fluoride_cancer_scanda\

l.htm) "

here is a request to send a much simpler second letter to President Bok.

We need to do this to show that interest in this issue is not going away but

growing.

In addition to the recommendations made below, some of you may be interested

in reading _the Bok 2003 interview _

(http://www.highereducation.org/crosstalk/ct0303/interview0303.shtml) as it

should give fodder in generating a

question or two to turn things around!

 

In addition a letter to the local newspaper may help boost queries to the

President on this matter.

Chris Gupta

_http://tinyurl.com/_ (http://tinyurl.com/zqwed) _zqwed

_ (http://tinyurl.com/zqwed) =========

Again I would like to emphasize how clearly this present struggle with

Harvard symbolizes the efforts of ourselves, and many of those who have come

before us, to get institutions - some highly respected like Harvard - to

exercise

integrity on the fluoridation issue - and how often they don't. But we have

Harvard in the cross hairs on this and we must not let President Bok wriggle

out of doing the honorable thing. Maybe his wife Sissela Bok holds the key -

note the last paragraph in Albert's letter, which some have incorporated into

their short letters.

Thanks for anything you can do to boost our numbers on this.

Paul Connett

You might also refer to the FAN home page at_ www.FluorideAction.net _

(http://www.fluorideaction.net/) for a comparison of the old and new Harvard

shields!

-------------------------

The short letter of support for Albert's letter, with the recommended

subject heading and cc, bcc destinations.

<_derek_bok_ (derek_bok) >

 

_Veritas or Non Veritas?_ (http://www.fluorideaction.net/harvard/)

Cc: <_margaret_dale_ (margaret_dale)

>, <_sbok_ (sbok) >

Bcc: <_paul_ (paul) >

 

Dear President Bok,

Please respond to Albert Burgstahler's Sept 10 letter to you by giving a

simple explanation as to how it was possible for the unnamed investigators at

Harvard to have exonerated Professor Douglass of charges of academic

dishonesty.

If you are unable to do this please use the power of your office to instigate

an independent review of this matter.

Signed

(name, state , country and any personal details of interest, e.g. a Harvard

grad; professional qualification; occupation; public health interest or a

parent of ... young boys)

-------------------------

Albert's Sept 10 letter

 

September 10, 2006

Derek Bok

President, Harvard University

Dear President Bok:

I am writing directly to you because Dean Margaret L. Dale's September 7,

2006 reply to the joint letter a group of Harvard alumni and I sent to you on

August 22, 2006, did not address the central issue raised in our letter

concerning Harvard's brief August 15, 2006 statement exonerating Professor

Chester

Douglass of any academic misconduct.

In essence Dean Dale simply reaffirmed the August 15 statement without

providing any explanation for Professor Douglass first having " hid, then

misrepresented, his graduate student's PhD dissertation, which found a 'robust'

association between fluoridated water and an increased risk of osteosarcoma in

young boys, a frequently fatal disease. "

What was submitted by the Environmental Working Group (EWG) to Harvard for

investigation showed that after the above dissertation submitted by Elise

Bassin had been approved and her PhD degree granted in 2001, Professor Douglass

made public statements categorically claiming his research did not find any

evidence for a significant association between water fluoridation and

osteosarcoma. In his one-page 2004 written statement to the National Research

Council

panel investigating evidence for this association, he cited Dr. Bassin's

dissertation as a reference but did not state that the " robust association "

reported in it contradicted what he presented in his statement.

Similarly, in his final report on his grant from the National Institute of

Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) to investigate the epidemiology of

osteosarcoma, he again cited Dr. Bassin's dissertation without noting that its

findings did not support his claim of no significant association between water

fluoridation and the incidence of osteosarcoma.

To be precise, in his report to both the NRC and the NIEHS, Professor

Douglass gave an " Odds Ratio of 1.2 to 1.4 between fluoride and osteosarcoma

that

was not significantly different from 1, " but he cited Elise Bassin's

dissertation as a reference without indicating that she had found a five- to

seven-fold increased risk for osteosarcoma in young boys exposed to fluoridated

water

in their 6th, 7th, and 8th years. (_A pdf file of Professor Douglass's

one-page communication to the NRC is available here._

(http://www.ewg.org/issues_content/fluoride/20050627/pdf/NIEHS_final_report.pdf)

)

This conduct by Professor Douglass is what is at the heart of our concern,

not whether fluoridation is safe or not. In scientific research, honest

scholarship requires that any cited reference that does not agree with the

position

of the author(s) be openly identified as such. By failing to do this,

Professor Douglass clearly misled his readers and committed a serious breach of

scientific trust and integrity. Dean Dale's letter did not provide any

explanation for why the Harvard review committee concluded that Professor

Douglass had

not committed research misconduct by acting in the manner he did, which is

the reason for our inquiry.

In concluding her letter to me, Dean Dale stated: " . . . Harvard stands

behind its faculty review processes, which are thorough and fair and which apply

to all [members of the] faculty, regardless of public interest in the matter. "

If this is the case, then a satisfactory explanation for why the review

committee did not find that any research misconduct had been committed should be

forthcoming.

Without such an explanation for dismissing the evidence of misconduct by

Professor Douglass, how can one conclude that Harvard is abiding by its

commitment to uphold academic integrity?

For the sake of living up to its exalted motto " Veritas, " Harvard University

would indeed do well to heed what an author well known to you wrote: " Trust

and integrity are precious resources, easily squandered, hard to regain. They

can survive only on a foundation of respect for veracity. " (Sisella Bok:

Lying - Moral Choice in Public and Private Life, Pantheon Books, New York, page

249)

Sincerely,

Albert W. Burgstahler, PhD, '53,

Professor Emeritus of Chemistry

The University of Kansas

Lawrence, KS