In an article published on July 8, 2013 on the news portal Inside Higher Ed, the journalist Colleen Flaherty reports that Eastman successfully sealed letters proving the conflict of interest of the scientists who found Tritan® safe. Currently, Eastman Chemical (hereafter referred to as Eastman) is suing two small Texan laboratories for misrepresentation of Eastman’s Tritan® resins (previously reported on by the FPF). In its suit, Eastman argues that the founder of both laboratories, Bittner, has a conflict of interest resulting from being the chief scientists at the research lab CertiChem and founder and chief scientific officer of PlastiPure, a laboratory aiming to develop safe, non-estrogenically active plastics. Similarly, there is an alleged conflict of interest of Osimitz and his colleagues, who found Tritan® to be safe (previously reported on by the FPF). Now, Eastman successfully requested the court to seal the documents showing that Eastman commissioned Osimitz and colleagues to carry out the study. While the researchers truthfully filled out the documents declaring their association with Eastman Chemical, the publisher of their article, the peer-reviewed scientific journal Food and Chemical Toxicology decided not to publish this information. As reported in Inside Higher Ed, A.Wallace Hayes, editor of Food and Chemical Toxicology did not respond to requests to comment on the allegations. The lawsuit is scheduled to begin this week in the U.S. District Court at the Western District of Texas in Austin.

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Inside Higher Ed

FPF article “Opinion: Eastman tries to silence private labs to avoid scandal over estrogenically active resin

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