In its March/April issue of 1998, the Ecologist magazine carried an article by Martin Walker which attributed to me bizarre beliefs about the causes of cancer that I do not hold and impugned my scientific independence.1 At the time, I chose to ignore this inaccurate article. With hindsight, however, this may have been unwise as the article has continued to be circulated and has, I understand, been referred to as if the contents were reliable by a member of one of the Chief Medical Officer of Health's advisory committees. It seems, therefore, necessary to put on record the incorrectness of some of the statements.

These include the following:

(1) “From 1979 to the end of his career, Sir Richard also received a very substantial yearly reward for research into cancer from General Motors.” This is untrue. In …