As I’ve pointed out here before, despite all the marketing and media hype about resveratrol, the health claims for it remain scientifically shaky. No one has actually proven that this compound, found in the skin of red grapes (and, thus, in wine), will protect you against heart disease, cancer, arthritis, dementia or anything else.
In fact, the initial research that launched the resveratrol frenzy — the finding by Harvard University biologist David Sinclair that the compound extended the life of laboratory rats — has been seriously challenged.
Yet scientific skepticism about resveratrol’s touted health benefits hasn’t stopped companies from selling resveratrol pills, capsules, powders and creams to gullible consumers. In 2009 (the last year for which I could find sales figures), American consumers alone spent more than $31 million on resveratrol supplements of one kind or another.
Sinclair himself created a company in 2004 to develop resveratrol-based anti-aging drugs — a company he sold to the pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline in 2008 for a reported $720 million.
Bizarre turn
Last week, however, the news about resveratrol took a truly bizarre turn, one that raises even more questions about the health claims being made in its name. Here’s what happened, as reported by Scott Hensley of National Public Radio:
After a three-year investigation, the University of Connecticut Health Center has told 11 scientific journals that studies they published by resveratrol researcher Dipak K. Das may not be trustworthy.
In 2008, the university got a tip about irregularities in Das’ work. The subsequent investigation identified “145 counts of fabrication and falsification of data,” according to a UConn statement. …
To be sure, there haven’t been retractions of Das’ published work. But the university is freezing research in his lab that is funded by outside groups and is refusing $890,000 in federal grant awarded to Das. UConn is also moving to dismiss him from the faculty.
A quick distancing act
Since the report was published, resveratrol companies and researchers have been distancing themselves from Das as fast as they can. They are trying to portray Das as a scientific outlier, someone whose work wasn’t all that important — or even noticed by them.
Sinclair, for example, told reporters that he didn’t know who Das was. “Today I had to look up who he is,” he stated to the New York Times. “His papers are mostly in specialty journals.”
Sinclair’s e-mail response to a reporter for the Chronicle of Higher Education was similar: “I’ve not worked with him [Das]. Looking through it, the work is generally not published in leading molecular-biology journals.”
But, as Adam Marcus, co-founder of the blog Retraction Watch and managing editor of Anesthesiology News quickly pointed out, Sinclair and Das had served together on an eight-member scientific committee of the first international scientific conference of resveratrol and health, which was held in Denmark in 2010. How, Marcus asked the Harvard researcher late last week, could he say he didn’t know Das?
“I apologize,” Sinclair responded. “I did not expect my off-the-cuff comments to be printed. I will be more careful.”
Whoops.
Further digging, this time by a Retraction Watch commentator, revealed that Sinclair had cited Das’ research at least twice in one of his own research papers.
Worth checking all claims
“None of this means anyone but Das is implicated in his potential misconduct,” Marcus writes. “And Das’ work may in fact be peripheral. … Still, when researchers with vested interests — be they intellectual or financial — in a controversial and lucrative field characterize another scientist’s work that way, it’s worth fact-checking their claims.”
“We’ll be following the upcoming retractions closely to see what kind of impact the withdrawal of the original papers will have on the field,” he added. “[Das] has, as we’ve noted, been cited frequently.”
You can read a summary of the 60,000-page (yes, that’s right) University of Connecticut report on Das’ misconduct here. For the record: Das denies he has done anything wrong, and has charged [PDF] the university with discrimination against Indian researchers.
Ancient history.
Dr Das has been discredited clearly. No one argues this. However because one insignificant researcher is accused of falsifying data, which relates to a study that was not considered of much importance in any event, does nothing to invalidate the tens of thousands of legitimate studies which show highly beneficial properties for transmax resveratrol.
Big pharma is on a rant lately to kill off this competing compound to their new, adverse effect laden, black label FDA warning, ineffective Diabetes drugs.