Ames has been everyone’s hero at one time or other. ;-)
“In the 1970s, Bruce Ames was a hero to environmentalists—the inventor of the Ames Test, which allows scientists to test chemicals to see whether they cause mutations in bacteria and perhaps cancer in humans. His research and testimony led to bans on such synthetic chemicals as Tris, the flame-retardant used in children’s pajamas. A world renowned cancer researcher with a calm, reasoned manner, Ames was an ideal witness in the case against man-made chemicals. As science writer John Tierney aptly described him in Hippocrates, “He has a quiet, kindly tone of authority as he patiently explains why things are the way they are....He sounds so sensible. which is one reason he made such a good witness for the environmentalists in the 1970s.”
But it’s a scientist’s imperative to change his mind when the data change— and recent data have made Ames deeply suspicious of high dosage chemical testing and especially of the notion that man-made chemicals are uniquely dangerous. We are, he has discovered, surrounded by mutagens—not only synthetic chemicals but also natural ones—and blindly banning suspicious modern substances can do more harm than good.”
http://reason.com/archives/1994/11/01/of-mice-and-men
It would be easy to create a similar study showing that people who take prescription drugs die earlier than those who don’t.