Alcohol’s effect on cardiovascular disease (CVD) has been a controversial subject in the scientific world. There have been concerns about the alcohol industry’s involvement in research funding, and the bias it creates in scientific reviews.
There has been evidence of corporations from the tobacco industry, food industry and pharmaceutical industry sponsoring and reshaping science in a way that suits their business. In recent years, it has been established that the alcohol industry, too, has sponsored studies in the alcohol and CVD literature. A 2016 study led by UK-based researcher Jim McCambridge had shown that “key industry actors have used evidence of purported health benefits in largely successful efforts to influence public policy globally, in particular by suggesting that alcohol is different from tobacco because of claimed health benefits”.
Studies have shown that the most common sources of funding are not the companies themselves but organisations created and funded by alcohol companies. The now disbanded Alcoholic Beverage Medical Research Foundation is one such example. In 2018, a $100 million clinical trial on how ‘moderate’ alcohol use affects health was cancelled in the US after it was found to be biased in producing findings, which suggested that small amounts of alcohol have health benefits. The alcohol industry and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) had funded the trial. It was found that NIAAA leaders have had extensive contacts with alcohol companies.
In December, another study led by McCambridge―Alcohol, cardiovascular disease and industry funding: A co-authorship network analysis of epidemiological studies―was published in ScienceDirect, which attempted to analyse the extent of the alcohol industry funding. The study analysed 713 unique primary studies with 2,832 authors, published between 1969 and 2019 and located within 229 co-authorship subnetworks. A co-authorship subnetwork is a group of authors who have collaborated on multiple papers and are connected through co-authorship.
The study found that there was industry funding across subnetworks and approximately 8 per cent of all papers declared industry funding. “The largest subnetwork dominated, comprising 43 per cent of all authors, with sparse evidence of substantial industry funding,” said the study. The study, however, found that the second largest subnetwork contained approximately 4 per cent of all authors, with largely different industry funders involved. The study also found that authors affiliated with Harvard, who collaborated with industry-funded authors at the review level, were found to be part of the largest epidemiological subnetwork at the primary study level. Also, it had been observed that a few influential authors in the field had declared significant involvement with the alcohol industry. However, the study authors noted that the declared industry funding should very much be regarded as identifying the tip of the iceberg.
Nevertheless, the study concluded without establishing a straightforward relationship between co-authorship network formation and alcohol industry funding of epidemiological studies on alcohol and CVD. However, it demanded a more fine-grained attention to patterns of alcohol industry funding and to key nodes (here, authors and organisations). “It may shed further light on how far industry funding may be responsible for conflicting findings on alcohol and CVD,” noted the study authors.