Communicating Our Science: Peer-Reviewed Publications

As active participants in this discussion, we champion an open and transparent approach when sharing information about our Smokeless Products. We believe through external peer review and discussion we continue to demonstrate transparency of our science.

Growth in Smokeless Products use has reinvigorated the discussion around Tobacco Harm Reduction, building support for pragmatic public health policies.^[1,2,3] Developing the underpinning science for this field is too urgent and too important to be left to any one part of the scientific community. And it is increasingly clear that regulators, academia and industry-funded science all have a role to play.

Our research programmes are strongly focused on the science to substantiate the risk of our Smokeless Products relative to cigarette smoking. We independently validate the science behind our Smokeless Products through publishing it in journals where science undergoes external peer review. Peer review is a process by which an author's research and ideas are critiqued by experts in the same field.

There are some journals that will not consider research that has links to tobacco companies. However, it is heartening that most journal editors and editorial boards believe good science speaks for itself and should be judged objectively by the peer review process. Most journals today have straightforward processes that ensure potential conflicts of interest are clearly disclosed.

We want to contribute to and stimulate the discussion around Tobacco Harm Reduction and have published more than 260 articles relating to Tobacco Harm Reduction and our Smokeless Products in international, peer-reviewed journals. We always choose an open access option, so there are no restrictions on who can read our research, and links to all our publications can be in the back of the Omni™ (see Chapter 11) and in the library of bat-science.com.