The secrets of Coca-Cola hidden in the funded studies that can be cancelled according to the results

Scientists from the University of Cambridge have discovered that the contracts that Coca-Cola stipulates with universities to finance scientific research contain suspicious clauses that raise important doubts. Let's see what's happening, if Coca-Cola is really trying to hide something from us and, above all, what kind of things.

Coca-Cola finances scientific research in universities, but a contract clause allows the company to preview the obtained results and, possibly, to block and eliminate these researches. This is what the researchers who published a study on documents related to Coca-Cola's university funding claim and who now questions the ethical and moral correctness of the company: the studies are blocked and never made public because the results put in bad light the drink? So maybe we don't know the whole truth about the benefits and risks associated with Coca-Cola? These are the questions we ask ourselves now. Here's what you need to know.

Coca-Cola and scientific research

Coca-Cola is the manufacturer of the homonymous and famous beverage that in recent years has been criticized for the large amount of sugar it contains: in fact, lately we have ‘realized' that our health enemy is not carbohydrates, but sugars. Just in 2016 a Pandora's box was uncovered on the subject: it turned out that in the past scientists had been paid to lie and hide the effects of sugar on health. But what does Coca-Cola have to do with it? Coca-Cola often funds scientific research in universities, but contracts with scientists are not entirely convincing.

The research

As it is known from the University of Cambridge, the study entitled "Always read the small print": a case study of commercial research funding, disclosure and agreements with Coca-Cola” shows how, by analyzing as many as 87,000 documents, the most famous beverage company in the world stipulates its contracts with the research centers that it finances.

Important clauses

Within the contracts there would be several clauses that give Coca-Cola the possibility to get a preview of the results of the studies and to have the right to "terminate the current study without reason", and that's not all. The company also reserves the right to appropriate all information collected by scientists in the context of the financed study and intellectual property.

Benefit of the doubt

It must be said that at present moment there is no concrete evidence of the elimination of studies, nor can we say with certainty what the possible blocked and canceled studies have shown, but what remains suspect is the clause that allows Coca-Cola in fact to bury what it does not consider appropriate to make public. But what this is, we cannot know. At least for now.