The timing and motivation of publishing something is a valid line of inquiry and not innuendo. Vaccine hesitancy is a salient topic of the day. A world leader accused a major social network of killing people by distributing misinformation [0]. Why would a publication choose this moment to editorialize about fraud in medical research? This wasn't a long running experiment from which new information was developed. Why publish now?

Maybe it has nothing to do with vaccines but rather maintaining the BMJ brand ahead of some new fraud they know will come to light, or a warning to researchers who might publish elsewhere. Why publish and why publish now?

0. https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/president-biden-facebook-soc...