Jan L. Breslow

Credentials

Background

Jan L. Breslow is a physician and professor at Rockefeller University, specializing in cardiovascular disease. He is a former president of the American Heart Association.⁴

Breslow was one of 16 scientists to sign a January 2012 Op-Ed in the Wall Street Journal declaring that there is “No Need to Panic About Global Warming,” despite having no experience in climate science or a related discipline.⁵

Stance on Climate Change

“No Need to Panic About Global Warming,” the inflammatory Op-Ed that Breslow signed, states:

“The lack of warming for more than a decade—indeed, the smaller-than-predicted warming over the 22 years since the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) began issuing projections—suggests that computer models have greatly exaggerated how much warming additional CO2 can cause. Faced with this embarrassment, those promoting alarm have shifted their drumbeat from warming to weather extremes, to enable anything unusual that happens in our chaotic climate to be ascribed to CO2.”

Key Quotes

October 2013

When the editor of the Washington Times refused to publish letters from climate change dneiers, Jan Breslow was quoted by Fox News as saying:⁶

“There was an effective embargo on alternative opinions, so making it official really does not change things.”

Key Deeds

February 4, 2018

In January 2018, more than 200 scientists endorsed an open letter calling on the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) to remove climate change denier Rebekah Mercer from its board and to “end ties to anti-science propagandists and funders of climate science misinformation.” The New York Times reported that those among the AMNH letter calling for Mercer to step down were Michael E. Mann, director of the Earth System Science Center at Pennsylvania State University, and Katharine Hayhoe, director of the Climate Science Center at Texas Tech University.⁷

Breslow was among a group of climate change deniers who responded with their own open letter, calling for the AMNH “not to cave in to this pressure.” The letter was signed by numerous individuals with ties to groups funded by the Mercer Family Foundation such as Will Happer of the CO2 CoalitionRichard Lindzen, a fellow at the Cato InstituteCraig Idso, the chairman of the Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change. There are a number of signatories affiliated with the Heartland Institute, which has received over $5.78 million from the Mercer Family Foundation since 2008.⁸

The letter reads:⁹

“The Earth has supported abundant life many times in the geological past when there were much higher levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. It is quite likely that future generations will benefit from the enrichment of Earth’s atmosphere with more carbon dioxide.

“Make no mistake, the agitators are not defending science from quackery — quite the contrary!”

February 23, 2017

Jan Breslow was a signatory of a petition (PDF) organized by Richard Lindzen of the Cato Institute urging President Donald Trump to pull the United States out of the United Nations international convention on climate change (UNFCCC).¹⁰

“In just a few weeks, more than 300 eminent scientists and other qualified individuals from around the world have signed the petition below,” Lindzen wrote in the letter.¹¹

DeSmog investigated the list, and found that only a small handful of the signatories could be considered “even remotely ‘qualified’ or ‘eminent’ — but not in the field of climate science.” The list included individuals “interested in climate,” and one signatory who only identified as an “emailer who wished to sign the petition” while some signers provided no affiliation or address whatsoever.¹²

January 27, 2012

Breslow’s signature appeared on a Wall Street Journal opinion piece claiming there is no need to panic about global warming.¹³

Other “scientists” who signed the article include Claude Allègre, J. Scott Armstrong, Roger Cohen, William Happer, William Kininmonth, Richard Lindzen, James McGrath, Rodney Nichols, Burt Rutan, Harrison H. Schmitt, Nir Shaviv, Edward David, Michael Kelly, Henk Tennekes, and Antonino Zichichi.

Media Transparency reported on the Op-Ed, concluding that most of the scientists have never published articles in peer-reviewed journals on the subject of climate change. They also contacted economist William Nordhaus who had been cited by the article, and he said that the WSJ was guilty of a “Complete Mischaracterization Of My Work.”¹⁴

1980s

Breslow’s name appears dozens of times in the Legacy Tobacco Documents Library. The tobacco documents reveal that RJ Reynolds tobacco company paid Jan Breslow for research with a 1987 gift.¹⁵

In one document, Frederick Seitz recommends Jan Breslow’s work to RJ Reynolds, noting that “Professor Breslow assures me that he can use the money very effectively.”¹⁶

Another document from 1986 notes that the RJ Reynolds’ Medical Research Committee would seek to “encourage Dr. Jan Breslow to submit a grant request proposal for approximately $250,000 per year for up to three years.”¹⁷

In another document, Breslow is invited (with an honorarium) to present a grant proposal to the Council for Tobacco Research, which had earlier been urged to “cultivate” him.¹⁸