Scientists and officials from the National Institutes of Health worked to solicit donations from the alcohol industry for a study they said would likely conclude that moderate drinking is healthy, according to a new report.
The report said that presentations by NIH officials gave the alcohol industry an opportunity to look at how the studies were being designed and to see who was conducting the investigation.
The findings come from a New York Times review of emails from agency officials, obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request. The eventual donations, which occurred under the Obama administration, went to the Foundation for the NIH, a nongovernmental entity that raises money for the agency. The $100 million study was largely funded by Anheuser-Busch InBev, Heineken, Diageo, Pernod Ricard, and Carlsberg, five of the largest alcohol manufacturers.
The NIH responded to the New York Times report by saying that groups involved in sponsoring studies are not allowed to influence research.
But the New York Times story notes that the eventual pick of lead scientist for the study, Dr. Kenneth Mukamal, had also helped persuade the alcohol industry to fund the research. The report also said that NIH policy prohibiting employees from soliciting or suggesting donations may have been breached.
Mukamal, who is a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and has published hundreds of papers on drinking and heart disease, said in the story, “My job there wasn’t to raise money. It was to educate.” He said he was committed to accurately reporting the results.
The 10-year study, now underway, involves 7,800 participants 50 years and older, across 16 different places. The participants were at risk of getting heart disease and half were asked to abstain from alcohol while the other half were told to have one serving of alcohol a day. Scientists are looking for differences in heart attacks, stroke, diabetes and death, over the course of six years per person. The study will not capture possible links to cancer.
Public health officials have been increasingly calling for restrictions on alcohol amid findings from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that alcohol-associated deaths are on the rise, particularly among people who have alcohol poisoning, cirrhosis, or chronic liver disease in middle age.
U.S. dietary guidelines say that moderate drinking for people of legal drinking age is defined as up to one drink per day for women and two drinks per day for men. They also state that the government does not recommend that people who currently abstain from alcohol “start drinking for any reason.”
