Heart Attack Vape Study Retracted After Scientists Uncover Flawed Data

The heart attack vape study in question was the catalyst for a stream of sensationalist fake anti-vaping news stories leading to the swathe of vape bans across America.

Published in June 2019 by vehement anti-vaping Professor Stanton Glantz, the study has now been retracted after scientists drilled into ‘data’ that apparently ‘proved’ vapers were twice as likely to suffer heart attacks than none vapers.

The main point of the study being rubbished is – and wait for it – many of the subjects in the research had suffered heart-attacks BEFORE they began vaping…

Worst still, some subjects had heart attacks BEFORE e-cigarettes were even available…yeah I know lol.

For a research paper like this to be retracted is highly unusual and should be a career killer for outspoken and disgraced major anti-vaping ‘expert’ Stanton Glantz.

He’s now back tracking and blaming the pro-vape lobby for the retraction – more on him in a moment especially as he featured prominently in the recent ITV vape hit piece.

Retractions like this only come after the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors delve deeper into the evidence of medical research and studies, and decide if there’s been:

Scientific misconduct in research and non-research publications includes but is not necessarily limited to data fabrication; data falsification including deceptive manipulation of images; purposeful failure to disclose relationships and activities; and plagiarism.

Serious stuff, however and as with pretty much ALL fake vape news, it’s highly doubtful the mainstream media will report on this which of course still leaves folks with the wrong impression that vaping does indeed cause heart-attacks.

Regular readers will know I’ve debunked the arguments that vaping damages the heart more than once:

• Will Your E-Cigarette Give You a Heart Attack?
• ‘Flawed’ Study Suggests Some E-Liquid Flavourings MAY Effect the Heart
• Vaping and Heart Health – Scientists Slam Latest Scare Study and Stories

Heart-Attack Vape Study Retracted

This week the lofty Journal of the American Heart Association decided the evidence given by Gantz and co-author Dharma N Bhatta, showed they hadn’t grasped the data and the retraction makes for damming reading.

The conclusions from the flawed study suggested that vapers and indeed dual vape and lit tobacco users were twice as likely to have a heart-attack.

Glantz had concluded:

Some‐day and every‐day e‐cigarette use are associated with increased risk of having had a myocardial infarction, adjusted for combustible cigarette smoking.

Effect of e‐cigarettes are similar as conventional cigarette and dual use of e‐cigarettes and conventional cigarettes at the same time is risker than using either product alone.

This say the experts over at JAHA is blatantly false:

After becoming aware that the study in the above‐referenced article did not fully account for certain information in the Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health [PATH] Wave 1 survey, the editors of Journal of the American Heart Association reviewed the peer review process.

During peer review, the reviewers identified the important question of whether the myocardial infarctions occurred before or after the respondents initiated e‐cigarette use, and requested that the authors use additional data in the PATH codebook (age of first MI and age of first e‐cigarettes use) to address this concern.

While the authors did provide some additional analysis, the reviewers and editors did not confirm that the authors had both understood and complied with the request prior to acceptance of the article for publication.

Ouch!

Glantz Responds To the Humiliation

As you can expect, such a prominent anti-vaper like Glantz is not about to go quietly.

Indeed he’s not blaming his flawed – OK fake data – instead he’s blaming pro-vaping medical experts putting ‘pressure’ on the editors at JAMA!

In particular Brad Rodu, a professor at the University of Louisville who was the first to challenge the findings.

Glantz was unmoved and in a statement said:

…I first learned of Rodu’s criticism when USA Today called me for a response to his criticism.

I was subsequently contacted by the Journal of the American Heart Association regarding Rodu’s criticism.

I responded by suggesting the editors invite Rodu to publish his criticism in enough detail for Dr. Bhatta and I to respond, as well as accurately disclose his links to the tobacco industry.

…Now, under continuing pressure from e-cigarette advocates (link 1, link 2), the editors of the Journal of the American Heart Association have retracted the paper because, without access to the PATH restricted use dataset, we have not been able to do the additional analysis.

The editors also gave Dr. Bhatta and me the option of retracting the paper ourselves.

We have not retracted the paper because, despite the fact that we have not been able to do the additional analysis Rodu is demanding, we still stand behind the paper.

Defiant to the end is our Stan the anti-vaping man!

Stan the ‘Hands On Man’?

Glantz has a shady past to say the least with two cases of sexual harassment filed against him, one of which was ‘settled out of court’.

In one case and after the woman filed the law-suit, Glantz removed her name from a study she had co-authored…nasty…

BTW, all of this is recorded on his Wikipedia page including:

Confidential internal UCSF investigations concluded that Glantz had “more likely than not” harassed the former researcher, and that his conduct constituted “hostile work environment sexual harassment”.

[39][7] UCSF concluded that Glantz had violated the Faculty Code of Conduct, and proposed that he take remedial anti-harassment training and that a letter of censure be placed in his personnel file.[7]

In October 2018, UCSF settled the lawsuit against Glantz for $150,000; Glantz and the University of California continue to dispute the allegations.[7]

In 2018, a second former employee filed a sexual-harassment lawsuit against Glantz; the University of California and Glantz denied these allegations as well.[8]

Tsk Tsk…

Glantz is still a professor at the Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education at the University of California, and it’s fair to say he’s an extreme anti-vaping exponent regularly used in the media.

Indeed the recent ITV ‘documentary’ How Safe Is Your Vape? Used him to portray vaping in a bad light.

BTW, following that vape documentary, OFCOM – the UK’s communications watchdog – received 49 complaints about the programme!

You don’t mess with vapers…

Let’s hope on the back of this humiliation, Glantz retires, though one doubts it given the kind of guy he is.

BTW…

The recent WHO report lambasting vaping and that I called both misleading and BS, included the theme that vaping causes heart attacks lol.

So this Tweet from the brilliant DR Moira Gilchrist from PMI made me chuckle:

Ha! Love it 🙂

Will the WHO retract as well?

Again one highly doubts it…