When PLOS One Corrected Undeclared Conflicts of Interest for 5 Articles From Benson-Henry Institute for Mind-Body Medicine
The long process of obtaining corrections began with an email from PLOS One after someone at PLOS noticed my single tweet complaining about one of the papers.
September 5, 2023 Introduction
At the time, I couldn’t figure out how my single tweet could precipitate a correction to five PLOS One articles from Herbert Benson’s group that is affiliated with Mass General and Harvard Medical School. Unfortunately, the link to the precise tweet in the letter from PLOS One is broken. Checking my social media activity from about that time I find myself critiquing the mindfulness literature in preparation for my upcoming mindfulness presentations in the next few months.
The issue of undeclared competing and conflicting interests was a hot one. As seen in my original story reproduced below, BMJ Editor and Publication Board member Richard Smith had quit BMJ and joined the PLOS publication board. He was lashing out at the New England Journal of Medicine about the money the journal made from the sale of reprints to pharmaceutical companies. Pharma reps gave them away in visits to positions in allied health professionals.
Yet, some activist Academic Edit…