Official Complaint Filed Over The Surgeon General Report On Passive Smoking

FORCES’s complaint concerns several worrisome aspects of the SG Report, including deficient data-gathering methodology, data cherry-picking, and misrepresentation of flimsy evidence, which reveal not simply bias, but a clear determination to reach or reinforce predetermined political conclusions. End Quote

(1888PressRelease) October 30, 2007 - USA - FORCES International has presented an official complaint based on rigorous scientific analysis of the 2006 Surgeon General’s (SG) Report on Passive Smoking to the Office of Research Integrity (ORI) of the United States in Washington, DC, and the complaint has been forwarded to the Inspector General of the Department of Health and Human Services.

FORCES’s complaint concerns several worrisome aspects of the SG Report, including deficient data-gathering methodology, data cherry-picking, and misrepresentation of flimsy evidence, which reveal not simply bias, but a clear determination to reach or reinforce predetermined political conclusions.

Based on such sham scientific bases, smoking bans are implemented in the United States and abroad, and have severe negative impacts on both the economies and the social fabric.

“Considering how serious and widespread this institutional problem is, we realize that we will not change the world overnight,” said Gian Turci, FORCES International CEO, “but we are morally and ethically compelled to report this grave misconduct of the SG to the ORI.”

Maryetta Ables, President of the organization, stated: “Innocent smoking citizens have become target practice for discrimination and social hatred. They are accused of anything from being killers to child abusers, all based on junk science, propagated with an appalling blindness to scientific and social ethics.”

The complaint has been presented also on behalf of several foreign branches of FORCES (such as FORCES Germany and FORCES Italy), as well as affiliate organizations such as the UK's Freedom to Choose, and other independent organizations.

FORCES International will maintain a section on its international website www.forces.org on the progress of the complaint. The direct link to that page is http://www.forces.org/static_page/ori/complaint.php.

FORCES International is an educational non-profit organization of volunteer workers funded by volunteer contributions.

Contacts:
USA: Maryetta Ables, President
Phone: 001 304-765-5394

EUROPE: Gian Turci, CEO
Phone: +39 010 388 459

Contacts for the signatory organizations:
Netzwerk Rauchen - FORCES Germany: Christoph Loevenich, President
Phone: +49 (0) 171 204 8698

FORCES Italiana: Gian Turci, President
Phone: +39 010 388459

Freedom to Choose: Colin Grainger, Chairman
Phone: +44 1261 842834 and (cell phone) +44-7917-366641

The Heartland Institute: Joseph Bast, President
Phone: 001 312 377 4000

Reason Foundation: Dr. Adrian Moore, Vice President
Phone: 001 661 477 3107

Bluegrass Institute for Public Policy Solutions: Jim Waters
Phone: 001 270 843 4642

Further information on signatory contacts is available at: http://www.forces.org/static_page/ori/complaint.php

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