In the Fight Over Gas Stoves, Meet the Industry’s Go-To Scientist

Dr. Goodman, who holds a doctorate in toxicology from Johns Hopkins College, is among the firm’s most outstanding scientists, serving to to defend industries as various as tobacco, plastics and fossil fuels in opposition to well being issues — a mirrored image of the widespread follow wherein numerous industries rent specialists who publicly help their place.

She helped develop knowledgeable testimony for Philip Morris in a class-action lawsuit that went to trial in 2015, portraying the tobacco large’s best-selling Marlboro Lights cigarettes as being safer for people who smoke. In a call for the plaintiffs, Choose Edward Leibensperger of Massachusetts Superior Courtroom mentioned Gradient’s evaluation “was proven to be inconsistent and opposite to the consensus of the scientific group.”

At Gradient, Dr. Goodman additionally co-authored an article, sponsored by the now-defunct American Plastics Council, criticizing dozens of educational articles that had raised issues over Bisphonal-A, or BPA, a chemical used to make laborious plastics similar to water and juice bottles. A physique of analysis means that BPA and different bisphenols can act as endocrine disruptors that intervene with hormones within the physique. The chemical compounds have been linked to diminished fertility, earlier puberty in boys and behavioral issues in youngsters.

In congressional testimony, Dr. Goodman has argued in opposition to regulatory requirements for mercury and air toxics, and has criticized research linking air air pollution and mortality, regularly figuring out herself as an unbiased scientist, regardless of Gradient’s work for company shoppers. In articles funded by the American Petroleum Institute, she has additionally attacked analysis linking publicity to smog-causing ozone to deaths from respiratory illnesses.

Frederick vom Saal, a professor emeritus of biology on the College of Missouri, is among the many scientists whose work Dr. Goodman has criticized. “There are over 1,000 publications on BPA, however she claimed none of them stand as much as their requirements,” he mentioned. He mentioned her argument is actually, “‘You don’t want to fret about something as a result of there’s so little publicity,’” he mentioned, including that a long time of analysis has proven that to not be true.

Gradient declined to remark.

Dr. Goodman’s presence in Multnomah stunned folks on the county listening to. The county, which incorporates most of Portland, just lately handed a decision geared toward lowering the well being results of air air pollution.

“We had been all taking a look at one another going, ‘Who’s that? Why is she right here?’” mentioned Melanie Plaut, a retired doctor in Oregon who was attending to induce for higher scrutiny of gasoline stoves. “There have been simply so many factors that wanted to be refuted.”