Intimidation of Researchers by Special-Interest Groups

To the Editor: As the complainant in the example involving multiple chemical sensitivity syndrome discussed in “The Messenger under Attack” Sounding Board article by Deyo et al. (April 14 issue), 1 I wish to correct some of the authors' many errors that grossly misrepresent this case and its applicability to their thesis. At issue in the study by Simon et al. of the immunology of multiple chemical sensitivity 2 was not the investigators' published results but what they withheld from peer review and publication — namely, a split-sample analysis of the reliability of their immune laboratory, showing, as Dr. Simon himself later . . .