The Coca-Cola Company had a “significant say” in research it sponsored at the University of South Carolina, according to a new report in the Journal of Public Health Policy.
The agreements USC signed with Coca-Cola provided $1.2 million in obesity research funding in 2013 and 2014, but allowed the company to abruptly cancel research, provide comments before publication and keep research data, according to documents released by the report's authors.
“This quote-unquote science isn't science, it's public relations,” said study co-author Gary Ruskin. “That's a problem with research ethics.”
