The latest issue of HealthBeat is expected to be delivered to members of the Association of Health Care Journalists any day now.
In this issue, we highlight some of our best advice and resources for covering the novel coronavirus and COVID-19, from keeping nursing home residents safe to debunking conspiracy theories (and doesn’t it seem as if there’s a new one each week?)
Photo: Luis Quintero via Pexels
The Association of Health Care Journalists has secured two recent successes in its ongoing effort to persuade medical societies to allow freelance journalists to use membership in AHCJ as a credential to attend meetings and media briefings.
The Gerontological Society of America and the American Gastroenterological Association have joined the American Society of Clinical Oncology, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and other organizations that have agreed to recognize professional-category membership in AHCJ as sufficient credential for admission to their meetings. Continue reading
Lily Eskelsen García
Lily Eskelsen García, president of the National Education Association, will join AHCJ’s webcast, “Reporting on school reopenings in the time of COVID-19,” scheduled for Thursday.
She will join Enriqueta Bond, Ph.D., chair of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, Medicine advisory committee on Reopening K-12 Schools in the Time of COVID-19; and Tina Q. Tan, M.D., professor of pediatrics and pediatric infectious diseases attending physician at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine. The webcast will be moderated by Bara Vaida, AHCJ’s core topic leader on infectious diseases. Continue reading
Candidacy statements for AHCJ’s annual board elections are now being accepted.
Each year, members in AHCJ’s professional category elect members for the association board of directors. (Associate and allied members cannot run for election or cast ballots.)
Six of the 12 director positions come up for election each year for two-year terms. Although incumbent board members are allowed to run for re-election, two have decided not to run again this year.
In an op-ed for the Columbia Journalism Review, Ivan Oransky, M.D., draws on an apt metaphor for reporters from other beats who are being assigned health-related stories during this pandemic.
“I imagine that the dread a newly transferred coronavirus reporter feels when faced with a PDF filled with statistics is the same as I would feel if —as a career-long doctor turned medical journalist — I was suddenly assigned to cover the statehouse.”
The Association of Health Care Journalists has announced a special, limited-time membership offer for non-health journalists suddenly thrust on the pandemic beat.
The six-month, half-priced membership will allow reporters, editors and news directors access to essential resources for covering the COVID-19 virus and understanding the medical science behind it. Continue reading