American Council on Science and Health (ACSH)

Koch Industries Climate Denial Front Group

$155,000 received from Koch foundations 1997-2009

The American Council for Science and Health is an industry-funded group that works to undermine not only climate change science, but the health threats associated with  controversial company products like bisphenol-A (BPA) and atrazine, a pesticide. According to Andy Kroll, writing for Mother Jones, “Elizabeth Whelan, a Harvard-trained public-health scientist, founded ACSH in 1978 as a counterweight to environmental groups and Ralph Nader’s consumer advocacy movement.”

In 1997, ACSH released a position paper titled “Global Climate Change and Human Health,” which claims that cutting greenhouse gas emissions, because it would hurt the economy, would be more detrimental to public health than global warming. “[P]olicymakers can safely take several decades to plan a response, and scientists will have enough time to develop cost-effective and anti-climate-change strategies.”

Among the reviewers of the report were two scientists financed by fossil fuel companies: Sallie Baliunas and Fred Singer.

According to internal American Council on Science and Health documents published by Mother Jones, ACSH also receives money from Chevron, the American Petroleum Institute, and many other large companies in the agribusiness, tobacco, chemical and soft drink sectors.

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