DataharvestEIJC2020

Conflict of interest in scientific research and twisted results is an eternal source of stories for investigative journalists. Scientific research is crucial to develop medicines to cure or relieve from illnesses. It is also indispensable to build science-based policies on climate change, obesity or daily exposure to chemicals. Scientists are also quoted in the media and shape the opinion on GMOs, pesticides or 5G. But are all these experts impartial? Could their opinion be blurred by corporate research fundings or invitations to sit in the scientific advisory boards of global companies? The capture of scientific knowledge by corporate interests is no secret and has been used to block regulation and maintain harmful products on the market. Now imagine there is a centralized conflict of interest database where you can get the list of industry collaborations of an expert in 10 seconds. This is what leading journalists in the field are trying to do. They call for a shared, open access, global database of conflicts of interest. The efforts are led by Stéphane Horel from Le Monde in France and Hristio Boytchev, freelance journalist in Germany. For this panel, they team up with a group of academics, tech experts and civil society organisations to present the groundwork for this global conflict of interest database.