Manufactured uncertainty: protecting public health in the age of contested science and product defense

Our plain-English summary of Manufactured uncertainty: protecting public health in the age of contested science and product defense, by D. Michaels (Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 2006).

The study

• Author: D. Michaels
• Journal: Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences
• Published: 2006;1076:149-62
• Cited by: 33 articles, as counted by NIH iCite
• Read it: PubMed · Publisher

Abstract

The strategy of "manufacturing uncertainty" has been used with great success by polluters and manufacturers of dangerous products to oppose public health and environmental regulation. This strategy entails questioning the validity of scientific evidence on which the regulation is based. While this approach is most identified with the tobacco industry, it has been used by producers of asbestos, benzene, beryllium, chromium, diesel exhaust, lead, plastics, and other hazardous products to avoid environmental and occupational health regulation. It is also central to the debate on global warming. The approach is now so common that it is unusual for the science not to be challenged by an industry facing regulation. Manufacturing uncertainty has become a business in itself; numerous technical consulting firms provide a service often called "product defense" or "litigation support." As these names imply, the usual objective of these activities is not to generate knowledge to protect public health but to protect a corporation whose products are alleged to have toxic properties. Evidence in the scientific literature of the funding effect--the close correlation between the results of a study desired by a study's funder and the reported results of that study--suggests that the financial interest of a study's sponsors should be taken into account when considering the study's findings. Similarly, the interpretation of data by scientists with financial conflicts should be seen in this light. Manufacturing uncertainty is antithetical to the public health principle that decisions be made using the best evidence currently available.

In plain English

This 2006 article is a commentary, not a study with new data. The author described "manufacturing uncertainty": questioning the scientific evidence behind public health regulation. Asbestos appeared only in a list of products whose producers, the author wrote, had used this strategy. The article did not discuss asbestos further. The author's examples included tobacco, beryllium, the drug phenylpropanolamine (PPA), bisphenol A (BPA) and Vioxx. On beryllium and lung cancer, the author wrote that three government-funded analyses found an elevated risk while one industry-funded reanalysis did not. Citing a review by vom Saal and Hughes, the author reported that 94 of 104 government-funded low-dose BPA studies reported an effect, compared with none of 11 studies funded by chemical corporations. The author called for federal agencies to independently verify manufacturers' data. The author concluded that manufacturing uncertainty runs counter to the public health principle that decisions be made using the best evidence currently available.

We wrote this plain-English summary from the full article with the help of AI, and a second AI model checked each sentence against the article. It is not the authors' wording; the abstract and the article are their own account.

What the study did and found

• Design: commentary (opinion essay) built on case examples; not an original research study
• Who was studied: No study population. The author discussed industry campaigns questioning evidence on tobacco, global warming, beryllium, PPA, BPA, Vioxx and other chemicals and drugs.
• Exposure: Asbestos is named only once, in the abstract, among products whose producers the author said used this strategy. The body of the article does not discuss asbestos, fiber types or asbestos diseases.
• Main results:
  • On beryllium and lung cancer, the author described three government-funded analyses that found an elevated risk and one industry-funded reanalysis that did not. The author presented this as an example of the funding effect.
  • The author wrote that a product defense firm's reanalysis of a CDC beryllium study changed some parameters, after which the elevated lung cancer rate was no longer statistically significant.
  • In a table adapted from vom Saal and Hughes (other researchers, not this article), low-dose in vivo BPA studies as of December 2004 were sorted by funder. 94 of 104 government-funded studies reported an effect. None of the 11 studies funded by chemical corporations did.
  • The author described the Department of Energy, during the author's tenure, issuing a new beryllium rule over industry objections that cut the acceptable workplace exposure level by a factor of 10.
  • The author wrote that PPA manufacturers, after learning a study had confirmed a link between PPA and hemorrhagic stroke, hired the Weinberg Group to attack that study.
  • The author proposed that federal agencies independently verify data and analyses submitted by manufacturers.
• The authors' conclusion: The author concluded that manufacturing uncertainty is contrary to the public health principle that decisions be made using the best evidence currently available.

Related studies

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• Adverse health effects of fluoro-edenitic fibers: epidemiological evidence and public health priorities — C. Bruno, P. Comba, et al. (2006)
• Reimagining Our System for Public Health Protection — D. Michaels (2019)
• Malignant mesothelioma among employees of a Connecticut factory that manufactured friction materials using chrysotile asbestos — M.M. Finkelstein, C. Meisenkothen (2010)
• Public health control of environmental asbestos disease: consumer products — B.H. Franklin (1979)
• The third wave of asbestos disease: exposure to asbestos in place. Public health control. Introduction — P.J. Landrigan (1991)

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