Conflict of Interest in Government Research by Proxy

The Environmental Working Group learned that a government agency, the Center for Evaluation of Risks to Reproductive Health, is outsourced to a Beltway (Alexandria, VA) firm, Sciences International. This discovery highlights an interesting instance of government by private sector proxy, but even more interesting is the government's apparent lack of transparency in awarding the contract to SI. It seems that SI previously had dealings with both Dow Chemical and RJ Reynolds, whom it is charged to investigate on matters before the Center.

To obtain this information, EWG used an infrequently used archive of web content, the Internet archive, which catalogs web content that's no longer available.