Former Philadelphia Inquirer executive editor Gene Roberts, whose paper won 17 Pulitzers in his 18 years in that job, was asked in an interview, âAre there any beats you would suggest the mainstream press is missing today?â?
Roberts: âOne of those is the medical crisis in the country. People write about it, but I don’t see the kind of sustained week-in, week-out coverage that the situation calls for.
You read now and then about the crisis in the emergency rooms and how many Americans are uninsured, but it isn’t really set up as a beat, so you have different reporters switching in and out of a story and you don’t get the expertise and the continuing coverage that would have if more reporters covered it as a beat. â¦
The FDA, the Food and Drug Administration, is another one not well reported by newspapers. The whole question about how rapidly and safely drugs get out to the public is another thing that is going uncovered.â?
Roberts is now a journalism prof at the University of Maryland. He won a Pulitzer of his own last month for his book, âThe Race Beat.â?
Comments
Please note, comments are no longer published through this website. All previously made comments are still archived and available for viewing through select posts.
Comments are closed.
Our Comments Policy
But before leaving a comment, please review these notes about our policy.
You are responsible for any comments you leave on this site.
This site is primarily a forum for discussion about the quality (or lack thereof) in journalism or other media messages (advertising, marketing, public relations, medical journals, etc.) It is not intended to be a forum for definitive discussions about medicine or science.
We will delete comments that include personal attacks, unfounded allegations, unverified claims, product pitches, profanity or any from anyone who does not list a full name and a functioning email address. We will also end any thread of repetitive comments. We don”t give medical advice so we won”t respond to questions asking for it.
We don”t have sufficient staffing to contact each commenter who left such a message. If you have a question about why your comment was edited or removed, you can email us at feedback@healthnewsreview.org.
There has been a recent burst of attention to troubles with many comments left on science and science news/communication websites. Read “Online science comments: trolls, trash and treasure.”
The authors of the Retraction Watch comments policy urge commenters:
We”re also concerned about anonymous comments. We ask that all commenters leave their full name and provide an actual email address in case we feel we need to contact them. We may delete any comment left by someone who does not leave their name and a legitimate email address.
And, as noted, product pitches of any sort – pushing treatments, tests, products, procedures, physicians, medical centers, books, websites – are likely to be deleted. We don”t accept advertising on this site and are not going to give it away free.
The ability to leave comments expires after a certain period of time. So you may find that you’re unable to leave a comment on an article that is more than a few months old.
You might also like