Doubt Is Their Product

{{Short description|2008 book by David Michaels}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}} {{Infobox book | name = Doubt is Their Product: How Industry's Assault on Science Threatens Your Health | image = Doubt is Their Product.jpg | image_size = 185px | caption = | author = David Michaels | illustrator = | cover_artist = | country = | language = | series = | subject = | genre = | publisher = Oxford University Press | pub_date = 2008 | english_pub_date = | media_type = | pages = | isbn = 0199719764 | oclc = | dewey = | congress = | preceded_by = | followed_by = }} '''''Doubt is Their Product: How Industry's Assault on Science Threatens Your Health''''' is a 2008 book by David Michaels, an epidemiologist and Professor in the Departments of Environmental and Occupational Health and Epidemiology at the Milken Institute School of Public Health of the George Washington University. Michaels served as Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health under U.S. President Barack Obama.

== Title ==

"Doubt is our product," Michaels quotes a cigarette executive as saying, "since it is the best means of competing with the 'body of fact' that exists in the minds of the general public. It is also the means of establishing a controversy."<ref>{{cite web |title=Internal memo from tobacco industry |url=https://www.industrydocuments.ucsf.edu/tobacco/docs/#id=xqkd0134 |website=Truth Tobacco Industry}}</ref> Michaels argues that, for decades, cigarette manufacturers knew that their product was hazardous to people's health, but hired mercenary scientists who "manufactured uncertainty by questioning every study, dissecting every method, and disputing every conclusion". In doing so the tobacco industry waged a campaign that "successfully delayed regulation and victim compensation for decades".

== Description ==

''Doubt is Their Product'' documents how the tobacco industry's tactics spawned a multimillion dollar industry that is dismantling public health safeguards in areas far from tobacco. Product defense consultants, he argues, have increasingly skewed the scientific literature, manufactured and magnified scientific uncertainty, and influenced policy decisions to the advantage of polluters and the manufacturers of dangerous products. To keep the public confused about the hazards posed by climate change, second-hand smoke, asbestos, lead, plastics, and many other toxic materials, industry executives have hired unscrupulous scientists and lobbyists to dispute scientific evidence about health risks. In doing so, they have not only delayed action on specific hazards, but they have constructed barriers to make it harder for lawmakers, government agencies, and courts to respond to future threats.<ref name="dm">{{cite book |author=Michaels, David |title=Doubt Is Their Product: How Industry's Assault on Science Threatens Your Health |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2008 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/doubtistheirprod0000mich/page/3 3]–4 |isbn=978-0-19-530067-3 |url=https://archive.org/details/doubtistheirprod0000mich|url-access=registration |quote=0-19-530067-X. }}</ref>

''Doubt is Their Product'' has been reviewed in ''Science'',<ref>{{cite journal |author=Carl F. Cranor |title=Public Health: The Tobacco Strategy Entrenched |journal=Science |volume=321 |issue=5894 |pages=1296–7 |date=5 September 2008 |doi= 10.1126/science.1162339|s2cid=153706560 |url=http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/321/5894/1296|url-access=subscription }}</ref> ''New Scientist'',<ref>{{cite journal |author=Merrill Goozner |title=Review: ''Doubt is Their Product'' by David Michaels and ''Bending Science'' by Thomas O. McGarity and Wendy E. Wagner |journal=New Scientist |volume= 198|issue=2660 |pages= 48–49|date=11 June 2008 |doi= 10.1016/s0262-4079(08)61496-7|url=https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19826605.900-review-doubt-is-their-product-by-david-michaels-and-bending-science-by-thomas-o-mcgarity-and-wendy-e-wagner.html?full=true&print=true|author-link=Merrill Goozner |url-access=subscription }}</ref> and ''Chemical and Engineering News''.<ref>{{cite journal |author=Britt E. Erickson |title=Manufacturing Uncertainty |journal=Chemical and Engineering News |volume=86 |issue=46 |pages=77–8 |date=November 17, 2008 |doi= 10.1021/cen-v086n046.p077|url=http://cen.acs.org/articles/86/i46/Manufacturing-Uncertainty.html|url-access=subscription }}</ref>

==References== {{reflist}}

==External links== *[https://www.c-span.org/video/?205879-1/doubt-product Presentation by Michaels on ''Doubt Is Their Product'', May 28, 2008]

Category:2008 non-fiction books Category:Books about health Category:Books about the politics of science Category:Books about media manipulation Category:Medical controversies Category:Books about multinational companies Category:Tobacco control Category:Doubt Category:Oxford University Press books