According to the Chron, three tobacco research administrators and an assistant sent an anonymous letter to researchers warning that the University of California may be planning to kill its tobacco research program. Now, their bosses at UC have put them on leave, and Vice President of Research and Graduate Studies Steven Beckwith allegedly told them their communication was “inappropriate.” Beckwith told the Chron that UC was merely reorganizing and consolidating some elements of its research program, but administrator Phillip Gardiner replied that the move could put people with no knowledge of tobacco-related diseases in charge of overseeing research, and that UC was cracking down on dissenters. “They are just trying to silence us,” he said.
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