CTR Special Projects Awarded To Carl Seltzer

Carl Seltzer was a professor of public health at Harvard University until 1976. He conducted research related to the constitutional and genetic hypothesis favored by the industry. Specifically, Seltzer's work focused on countering the evidence that smoking causes heart disease. Like Rothschild's work, Seltzer's work could be used by the tobacco industry to divert attention from tobacco as a cause of disease.

When Seltzer retired from the Harvard University School of Public Health on June 30, 1976, he continued his research on "constitution and disease" at the Peabody Museum at Harvard. The Peabody Museum is a natural history museum, which is an odd place to do tobacco and health research. Nevertheless, during his retirement Seltzer was awarded grants of more than $750,000 from 1976 to 1990 through CTR special projects and Special Account 4 (table 8.1). A 1976 letter from Donald Hoel of Shook, Hardy, and Bacon describes the arrangements made with Dr. Seltzer and the Peabody:

Dr. Stephen Williams, Director of the Peabody Museum, has indicated that appropriate arrangements can be made. Such arrangements would be quite similar to those previously maintained at the Harvard University, School of Public Health. The total cost for one year's support from July 1, 1976, through June 30, 1977, would be $50,000. This sum includes a 15 percent "overhead" allocation to the Peabody Museum. Dr. Seltzer's salary, secretarial assistance, purchase or leasing of certain equipment, telephone service, etc., would be paid from the balance of these funds. {2004.01}

An April 4, 1979, memo from Hoel to the counsels for the tobacco companies approved an increase in Dr. Seltzer's annual grant from $60,000 to $70,000 to cover, in part, "increased travel expense for lectures" {2004.09}. As described below, Seltzer traveled extensively to speak about his work and stimulate controversy about the association between tobacco and heart disease.

A 1979 letter from Donald Hoel to the counsels of the tobacco companies describes a trip that Carl Seltzer made to New Zealand and Australia

[to] meet with scientists, science writers and some industry people concerning his research and opinions on smoking and heart disease. ... Personal reports from colleagues in Australia and New Zealand indicate that Dr. Seltzer's visit "was a great success." {2004.12}

Eight news clippings and radio transcripts covering Seltzer's visit are attached to the letter. The clippings—with titles such as "Smokers—Take Heart," "Doctor Slams Link between Smoking and Heart Disease," and "Smoking Does Not Cause Heart Disease"—describe Seltzer as a doctor from Harvard University. Only one small clipping discloses that Seltzer was "in Australia at the Tobacco Institute's invitation" {2004.13}. This type of press coverage that is favorable to the tobacco industry is significant because it demonstrates how the industry was quietly paying for scientists to publicize its position that tobacco is not dangerous. Scientists such as Seltzer, who were well-known researchers or had connections to prestigious institutions, lent a patina of legitimacy to the industry's claims that tobacco is not harmful. Seltzer was valuable to the tobacco industry, in part, because it could exploit his connection with Harvard University in press coverage.

Seltzer criticized scientific studies that found an association between tobacco and adverse health effects, and his efforts were monitored by the lawyers. An April 4, 1983, letter from Patrick Sirridge of Shook, Hardy, and Bacon to the counsels for the tobacco companies describes

Seltzer's activities—especially his analysis of a landmark study that found an association between smoking and heart disease (3, 4).

Dr. Seltzer has been very active in the past year analyzing literature dealing with coronary heart disease (CHD) and advancing his views on the smoking and CHD issue. In particular, he spent a great deal of time reviewing the results of the Multiple Risk Factor Intervention Trial (MRFIT). In this regard, the Journal of the American Medical Association [which published the MRFIT study] recently published his letter [5] commenting on the MRFIT findings. Dr. Seltzer also presented his views about smoking and CHD and MRFIT in a written statement to the Waxman Subcommittee. {2004.21, p. 1}

A 1984 memo from Ernest Pepples to I. W. Hughes, J. Alar, and T. Humber illustrates that researchers funded through special projects were asked to respond to data presented in the lay media as well as in the scientific literature. Seltzer was asked to respond to unfavorable press on tobacco that was aired on the MacNeil/Lehrer television news program. The memo states:

At B&W's request through Horace Kornegay [chairman of the Tobacco Institute], Carl Seltzer wrote the attached letter to Robin MacNeil taking issue with Dr. Castelli's [an investigator in the Framingham study] comments on the January 11 MacNeil/Lehrer program. My guess is MacNeil will send it to Castelli for rebuttal or he will just chuck it in the waste can. {2004.23}

Carl Seltzer's two-page letter to Robin MacNeil, dated January 31, 1984, states:

I found some of Dr. Castelli's statements relative to smoking and heart disease to be biased, flawed, and inaccurate. {2004.25, p. 1}

Seltzer's letter critizes the Framingham heart study, which evidently had been discussed in the interview. This study, the largest population-based study of heart disease epidemiology, had found that smoking is a cause of heart disease (6, 7). In an hominem attack on the scientist rather than the science, Seltzer claims that Castelli deliberately misled the "American public":

I merely wanted you to get some idea of deliberate inaccuracies in the Castelli statements to you and the public, and in the flaws in the works of the Public Health Service's Framingham Study. {2004.25, p. 2}

In the letter to MacNeil, Seltzer devotes a paragraph to describing his own qualifications in an effort to establish that he is a credible, independent scientist. Seltzer does not state that his work has been supported

by the tobacco industry during these years, nor does he mention that B&W's lawyers asked him to write the letter to MacNeil.