Chat message

Slack / Private Message Drop, p.120 [SLACK_000334] · slack_pm:msg:01224

Date: 2020-07-29 17:35
Type: chat message · slack
recipient: Kristian G. Andersen, Robert F. Garry, Andrew Rambaut
speaker: Edward C. Holmes
Topics: Proximal Origin paper Intelligence community assessments

Recipients on this medium are inferred from channel membership, not per-message addressing.

Dear Clare, We wanted to alert you to this anonymous email that was shared with us from a reputable journalist. The email makes several serious allegations, including details about a confidential and private meeting involving senior US andUK officials/scientists on a topic that is highly sensitive but ultimately led to our "Proximal Origins" paper that wesubmitted to Nature some months ago. The allegations are false, we feel they are libelous, and we are taking this matter very seriously. We are contacting you because the email also shows a breach in confidentiality of the peer review process. The anonymous emailer (individual B) names you and Nature and describes several private and confidential details about the review process. Clearly, individual B is either Reviewer 2 of our paper, or Reviewer 2 shared confidential information with them. There are no other explanations for how this person could have known it had been reviewedby Nature or details of the review, except for a breach of the peer review process: we have not shared any of the peer review details with anyone. It does not appear that individual B knew that you discussed the paper directly with Nature Medicine, nor does it appear that the person knew who the handling editor was at that journal (Joao).We are very sorry to have to bring this to your attention, but given how serious a matter this is, we feel we have nochoice as our scientific reputations are being judged.Please let us know if you have any questions. We are available for a phone call if that would be helpful. Best, Kristian and Eddie

Extracted statements

Rule-extracted, not adjudicated. The grade says what may be done with each one; read the document above before relying on any of them.

Statement	Grade	Attribution	Stance
The email makes several serious allegations, including details about a confidential and private meeting involving senior US andUK officials/scientists on a topic that is highly sensitive but ultimately led to our "Proximal Origins" paper that wesubmitted to Nature some months ago.	quoted / not their view	quoted_external sentence carries quotation marks	asserts
Clearly, individual B is either Reviewer 2 of our paper, or Reviewer 2 shared confidential information with them.	own voice, substantive	speaker_own	asserts
It does not appear that individual B knew that you discussed the paper directly with Nature Medicine, nor does it appear that the person knew who the handling editor was at that journal (Joao).We are very sorry to have to bring this to your attention, but given how serious a matter this is, we feel we have nochoice as our scientific reputations are being judged.Please let us know if you have any questions.	own voice, substantive	speaker_own	asserts

Statement

Grade

Attribution

Stance

The email makes several serious allegations, including details about a confidential and private meeting involving senior US andUK officials/scientists on a topic that is highly sensitive but ultimately led to our "Proximal Origins" paper that wesubmitted to Nature some months ago.

quoted / not their view

quoted_external sentence carries quotation marks

asserts

Clearly, individual B is either Reviewer 2 of our paper, or Reviewer 2 shared confidential information with them.

own voice, substantive

speaker_own

asserts

It does not appear that individual B knew that you discussed the paper directly with Nature Medicine, nor does it appear that the person knew who the handling editor was at that journal (Joao).We are very sorry to have to bring this to your attention, but given how serious a matter this is, we feel we have nochoice as our scientific reputations are being judged.Please let us know if you have any questions.

own voice, substantive

speaker_own

asserts

In context

A single line often inverts meaning once you see what it answers, so neighbouring messages are always shown.

2020-07-29 16:23 Andrew Rambaut open

I am just trying to think through what she will do?
2020-07-29 16:24 Kristian G. Andersen open

I don't think we're giving away anything are we? She'll reach out to Reviewer 2 and possibly 1. And bring it up with the journal
2020-07-29 16:43 Andrew Rambaut open

Made some suggested edits to disentangle the libellous allegations from the reviewing breach. Feel free to revert.
2020-07-29 17:35 Edward C. Holmes open

I've made some edits as well. My version is below. We need to think this through very carefully. Kristian, you should run it past your comms person. I don't think we should ask Clare to resolve the matter as it's not her doing and this just puts it ball in her court which seems unfair. I think just alerting her is enough:
2020-07-29 17:35 Edward C. Holmes

Dear Clare, We wanted to alert you to this anonymous email that was shared with us from a reputable journalist. The email makes several serious allegations, including details about a confidential and private meeting involving senior US andUK officials/scientists on a topic that is highly sensitive but ultimately led to our "Proximal Origins" paper that wesubmitted to Nature some months ago. The allegations are false, we feel they are libelous, and we are taking this matter very seriously. We are contacting you because the email also shows a breach in confidentiality of the peer review process. The anonymous emailer (individual B) names you and Nature and describes several private and confidential details about the review process. Clearly, individual B is either Reviewer 2 of our paper, or Reviewer 2 shared confidential information with them. There are no other explanations for how this person could have known it had been reviewedby Nature or details of the review, except for a breach of the peer review process: we have not shared any of the peer review details with anyone. It does not appear that individual B knew that you discussed the paper directly with Nature Medicine, nor does it appear that the person knew who the handling editor was at that journal (Joao).We are very sorry to have to bring this to your attention, but given how serious a matter this is, we feel we have nochoice as our scientific reputations are being judged.Please let us know if you have any questions. We are available for a phone call if that would be helpful. Best, Kristian and Eddie
2020-07-29 18:05 Kristian G. Andersen open

Sounds good. And let's wait until we hear back from Jeremy before next steps - there's no rush
2020-07-29 18:05 Kristian G. Andersen open

My comms person already looked at it and thought it looked good - he had a few minor edits that I introduced
2020-07-29 18:38 Robert F. Garry open

Extra points for subtle clues - individual B - very Agatha Christie!
2020-07-29 18:43 Kristian G. Andersen open

Well, I called him 'RB', but Andrew thought that was a little too much...

Full conversation →