Two journals of a leading microbiology society have retracted six articles by Didier Raoult after a university investigation found breaches of research ethics in his work.
A seventh article by authors affiliated with the research institute Raoult formerly led was also retracted for ethical issues.
In comments to Retraction Watch, Raoult, who has filed a criminal complaint against a scientist who found issues in his publications, called the retractions “just another form of science censorship” based on “complete ignorance” of France’s research ethics laws.
The American Society for Microbiology, which publishes the journals in which the articles appeared, marked most of the papers with expressions of concern in September 2022. The notices stated that the articles were “being reviewed as part of a ‘scientific misconduct investigation’ by the University of Aix Marseille.”
That investigation has apparently concluded, as each retraction notice mentions its findings with similar wording. The notice for one paper stated:
Following the publication of the Expression of Concern at https://doi.org/10.1128/aac.00782-22, the University of Aix Marseille conducted an ethical assessment of this letter to the editor, for which the majority of the authors were also affiliated with IHU Méditerranée Infection. The ethics committee, comprising independent and international members, specifically evaluated participant recruitment for the study, sample collection, and whether the authors had appropriate ethical approvals from the Institutional Review Board.
According to the investigation report, the sentence in the letter reading “This study was performed after ethical approval by the local ethics committee (accession number 10–002, 2010)” is incorrect. Furthermore, this kind of study conducted for research purposes falls “under the French law on the protection of research participants, therefore, it should have been submitted to CPP (Committees of the Protection of Persons). Formally, this paper could not be deemed in conformity with the Declaration of Helsinki and the French Law and regulations.”
In light of the severity of the research ethics breach indicated by these findings and in accordance with COPE guidelines, this article is being retracted by ASM and AAC.
These are the seven retracted papers, which have collectively been cited more than 150 times, according to Clarivate’s Web of Science:
- “Vitamin D and prolonged treatment with photosensitivity-associated antibiotics,” Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, 2013
- “Abnormal weight gain and gut microbiota modifications are side effects of long-term doxycycline and hydroxychloroquine treatment,” Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, 2014
- “Detection of a knockdown resistance mutation associated with permethrin resistance in the body louse Pediculus humanus corporis by use of melting curve analysis genotyping,” Journal of Clinical Microbiology, 2012 (not authored by Raoult)
- “High prevalence of Mycoplasma faucium DNA in the human oropharynx,” Journal of Clinical Microbiology, 2016
- “Clostridium scindens is present in the gut microbiota during Clostridium difficile infection: a metagenomic and culturomic analysis,” Journal of Clinical Microbiology, 2018
- “Fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) and peptide nucleic acid probe-based FISH for diagnosis of Q fever endocarditis and vascular infections,” Journal of Clinical Microbiology, 2018
- “Passive filtration, rapid scanning electron microscopy, and matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization–time of flight mass spectrometry for Treponema culture and identification from the oral cavity,” Journal of Clinical Microbiology, 2019
The editors in chief of both journals that retracted papers told Retraction Watch they had no comment beyond the published notices.
Scientific sleuth Elisabeth Bik, who was one of the people who uncovered issues in Raoult’s work (and whom he sued), wrote on X (formerly known as Twitter):
Other researchers flagged four of the now-retracted papers in an analysis that found issues with the ethics approvals of 456 studies published by researchers affiliated with the IHU Méditerranée Infection, including “248 [that] were conducted with the same ethics approval number, even though the subjects, samples, and countries of investigation were different.”
Raoult retired as director of IHU-MI in 2022 after overseeing it since 2011. His retirement followed an inspection by the French National Agency for the Safety of Medicines and Health Products that found “serious shortcomings and non-compliances with the regulations for research involving the human person.”
The retractions from the American Society for Microbiology are the latest in a string of publisher’s actions on Raoult’s articles. In October, Scientific Reports retracted two papers because the authors “were not able to provide documentation of appropriate approval from an ethics committee.” The publisher PLOS has marked nearly 50 of Raoult’s articles with expressions of concern related to ethics, and Elsevier is investigating an unspecified number of papers that appeared in New Microbes and New Infections and its other journals.
In response to our request for comment, Raoult said he had been “harassed following incredulity on government and scientific press on covid 19.”
He continued:
The retractions are based on very primitive analysis of gels that we demonstrated are wrong, the failure to send the original western blor [sic] of a 23 year old paper and a complete ignorance of the ethic laws of France
This in [sic] insane and in contrast with most justice process this is not a balanced analysis
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Ethics does not change the science.
Bitter experience shows that if scientists are allowed to publish results based on unethical experimentation, they are incentivized to keep performing it. This has led to very, very ugly places in the past, which is what is behind the current consensus that such papers should be retracted.
Also, once you know that one line in the paper is apparently a lie (the line on ethics approval) it casts doubts on other parts.
One question is “why?”
These are experiments on bacteria. But few patients would object to having any experiment, no matter how inhumane, performed on bacteria collected from them. The only reason that comes to mind is that the researchers sought to save time, thinking that because bacteria, not humans, were the subjects, one need not shpw concern for the humans from which the bacteria were collected.
One of the things ethics oversight is supposed to insure is that the human subjects are informed as to what is being done and why. We don’t know that that was the case.
People are also entitled to say, I don’t like the purposes of your research and I don’t want to contribute to it. But they can’t do this if they don’t know the purpose of the research.
Driving a car still requires a license, even for F1 champions…
Actually, this is not true. I remember Michael Schumacher being taken away driving license for speedy drive, and still being allowed to drive F1 races …
Indeed. The Tuskegee data is flawless. What? Me worry?
No, but science gained at the expense of ethics should never be tolerated.
If this science is valid, supporting research can be done ethically.
Is he really claiming that a French university is completely ignorant of French law on the protection of research subjects? Or is he hoping that nobody will notice that the investigation was carried out by the University of Aix Marseille, not by someone in the United States?
https://dynamic.uoregon.edu/jjf/defineDARVO.html#:~:text=DARVO%20stands%20for%20%22Deny%2C%20Attack,whistle%20blower%20%2D%2D%20into%20an
This has been Raoult’s playbook rather consistently.
Why am I not surprised?