Investigations
113 stories
Three Sydney Space-Physics Papers Outlasted a 2023 Fabrication Finding Against Their First Author
A 2023 Sydney inquiry found Joachim Schmidt fabricated a figure in an unpublished manuscript. Journals now say figures in three of his published papers were likely fabricated too, and those retractions began with an anonymous complaint to the publisher in 2024.
InvestigationsFrom 'Vaccine Hesitancy' to 'Trust': Five Years of NIH Insiders Grading Vaccine-Injury Research by Public Reaction
In 2021 Francis Collins warned that a paper on nerve symptoms after COVID vaccination would feed 'vaccine hesitancy.' This month the NIH hospital board's chair warned the new clinic's findings would be dismissed either way. Of decided federal COVID countermeasure claims, 98.4 percent were denied.
InvestigationsA Melbourne Gender Study Scored 234 Children on Their Transition Goals and Left Wellbeing Out
Researchers at Melbourne's Royal Children's Hospital sorted 234 children aged 8 to 17 by how many of their name, pronoun and appearance goals they had reached. Their cohort tracks mental health, and the paper did not analyze it as an outcome.
InvestigationsOven Gloves Bought From a Top Online Retailer Tested 89 Percent Asbestos
A private citizen asked two Italian mineralogists whether a cheap pair of heat-resistant gloves labeled Made in China was asbestos. The lab answered 89 percent chrysotile by weight, and the listing never said so.
InvestigationsWomen Who Cleaned Lost Lung Function at a Pace Compared to Smoking 10 to 20 Cigarettes a Day
Over 20 years, women who cleaned at home or for a living lost lung function faster than women who didn't. Tested scented products gave off carcinogens their labels never named, and single-chemical safety limits weren't built for the mixture under your sink.
InvestigationsWe Were Told to Disinfect Everything. The Chlorine Gas Calls Never Came Back Down.
US poison centers logged a 39.8 percent jump in chlorine gas exposures the year disinfection messaging peaked. Through 2022 here and 2025 in France, the numbers never came back down.
InvestigationsThe WHO Asked the World to Listen to Mental Health Patients. By Its Own Count, Half Were Committed Against Their Will.
The WHO built this year's World Mental Health Day around putting patients in charge of policy. Its own 2024 atlas reports 49% of reported admissions are involuntary and nearly a quarter of hospital stays run past a year.
InvestigationsThe Weedkiller RFK Jr. Blamed for Chronic Disease Is Now a National-Security Asset
RFK Jr. once called glyphosate a likely culprit in America's chronic disease epidemic. As health secretary he defended a Defense Production Act order boosting it, and his own base is in revolt.
InvestigationsThe Nerve Chip You Inject Through a Needle Hasn't Eased Anyone's Pain Yet
Built with no battery and no wires and placed through a needle, the seed-sized chip could avoid some of the hardware failures behind today's spinal cord stimulator recalls. Nobody has yet shown it relieves pain in people.
InvestigationsThe Mucosal Immunologist His Own University Declared No COVID Expert
Robert Clancy spent his career on the airway immunity a shot in the arm was never built to raise. When the transmission promise collapsed, Newcastle had already ruled him no COVID expert.
InvestigationsThe CDC's Flu-Shot Effectiveness Figures Come Out of a Regression Model, Not a Trial
The CDC's 41 percent flu-shot figure for seniors comes from a regression run on sick clinic patients, and the study's own tables show timing, exclusion and healthy-vaccinee biases built into it.
InvestigationsThe Byline Broker Signed Its Sales Pitch With a London Oncologist's Name
Springer Journals Online sold co-author slots on papers it said were nearly through review at Elsevier, Wiley and Springer Nature, and signed the pitch with a cancer researcher's name. Its website is gone. The manuscripts have not been publicly identified.
InvestigationsThe 33 Infections the CDC's 90 Percent Vaccine Number Left Out
In March 2021 the CDC announced that mRNA vaccines cut infection risk by 90 percent. Its own report set aside 33 infections that struck in the days after the shot, and a peer-reviewed critique shows how that counting rule can make a useless vaccine look 48 percent effective.
InvestigationsNew York Keeps 51 Cents of Every Dollar Its Gamblers Lose, and the Addiction Tripwire It Just Proposed Doesn't Trip Until a $10,000 Single-Day Deposit
New York taxes sportsbooks on the money bettors lose at 51 percent and has booked $3.89 billion since 2022. The at-risk rules its Gaming Commission proposed October 9 adopt New Jersey's model, whose deposit trigger DraftKings already meets: more than $10,000 in a single day.
InvestigationsMedical Chatbots Reached African Patients Before the Benchmark Meant to Grade Them
More than 500,000 people in Kenya texted an AI maternal-health line in 2024. The money to test tools like it arrived in 2026, and the global yardstick to grade them is still being built.
InvestigationsYour Country's Estimated Heat Death Toll Depends on Which Heat Metric the Modelers Picked
Japan recorded 1,522 heatstroke deaths in 2020. One model called that unusually high; a better-fitting one put it inside the expected range. Europe's estimated heat tolls bend to the same kind of choice.
InvestigationsPhysics of Fluids Sent a Postdoc's Name to the Authors Whose Algebra He Flagged
AIP Publishing tells its editors to protect the anonymity of anyone raising a concern. Physics of Fluids sent a postdoc's name, institution and rank to the authors he challenged, and 8 referees later found nothing to defend in their paper.
InvestigationsIn Cancer Alley, the Most Polluted Air Came With More Than Four Times the Odds of a Newborn Heart Defect
Among Louisiana mothers without private insurance, the heaviest modeled industrial air toxics tracked with 4.29 times the odds of a baby born with a heart defect. The scientist who led the work says Tulane gagged her pollution research.
InvestigationsThe HeartMate 3 Won Its Market on a Low Stroke Count. The Neurologic Events It Left Off Are Just as Common.
Eight percent of HeartMate 3 patients have a stroke. Another 8 percent have a seizure, a transient ischemic attack, or a brain bleed its headline safety score never tallied, and two-year survival in those patients runs as low as 45 percent.
InvestigationsIn Pfizer's Pivotal Trial, a Volunteer's Pericarditis Became a 'Suspected COVID' Case That Counted Against No One
The only Argentine site in Pfizer's pivotal trial was run by the same doctor who authored the results, and when a 35-year-old developed pericarditis after his second dose, the records moved the episode off the vaccine's ledger.
InvestigationsThe Mandatory Drug-Pricing Rule Nearly Every Major Drugmaker Was Allowed to Skip
Medicare's actuaries scored the final rule at $440 million in savings. The proposal they started with was worth $12 billion.
InvestigationsThe FDA Is Recruiting New Advisers Without Publishing the Rule for Who's Too Conflicted to Sit
Acting commissioner Kyle Diamantas is inviting scientists and 'consumer voices' onto the FDA's advisory panels. The agency has never published how it decides which of them carries a disqualifying conflict, thirteen years after Congress ordered it to.
InvestigationsThe MAHA Summit Charged Corporations Up to $300,000 for a Seat Beside the Officials Who Regulate Them
UnitedHealth got a panel. Grail, whose cancer test sat before the FDA, helped foot the bill. The regenerative ranchers and pesticide experts were nowhere on the program.
InvestigationsFor Five Years This Nurse-Led Florida Clinic Was a Federal 'Look-Alike.' Now It's Wired Into the Real Machine.
A West Palm Beach clinic run by nursing faculty, nurse practitioners, and their students spent five years as a federal 'look-alike.' Funded status adds a $650,000 grant, federal malpractice cover, and loan backing on top of the deep 340B drug discounts and sliding-scale mandate it already ran on.