Back in 1998 Andrew Wakefield duped Lancet with a concocted MMR autism study and the consequence of that study still haunt us to this day.
Now it appears this has happened again.
Now it appears this has happened again.
Even though the retraction was quick, the damage to future research is permanent. If this was in fact a propaganda operation rather than just incompetence, pride and an unethical career gambit, it was an incredibly successful one.
When someone fakes data to this degree, in a case that has this level of immediate real-world impact, one has to question the motivation behind it. Hope this gets illuminated during the investigation, but I'm not holding my breath.