Alison Bass
Occupation
  • professor
  • journalist
LanguageEnglish
NationalityAmerican
CitizenshipAmerican
Genrenon-fiction
Subject
Notable worksSide Effects: A Prosecutor, a Whistleblower and a Bestselling Antidepressant on Trial
Website
Alison Bass

Alison Bass is an American journalist and author of three books: her memoir, Brassy Broad: How one Journalist helped pave the way to #MeToo (2021); Getting Screwed: Sex Workers and the Law and Side Effects: A Prosecutor, A Whistleblower and a Bestselling Antidepressant on Trial. Side Effects won the National Association of Science Writers' Science in Society Award and its film rights were recently optioned.

Biography

Bass was a longtime medical and science writer for The Boston Globe and was the first Globe reporter to break the story of a sexually abusive priest in Massachusetts (Father Porter), a decade before the Globe's Spotlight team published its story about the Catholic Church abuse scandal in the Boston area.[1][2]

Her work has also appeared in the Los Angeles Times, Harvard University's Nieman Reports, The Miami Herald, Psychology Today, The Huffington Post and Technology Review, among other publications. She blogs regularly at [1] She recently retired as associate professor of journalism at West Virginia University. Before coming to West Virginia, Bass taught at Brandeis University and Mount Holyoke College.

Her first book, Side Effects: A Prosecutor, a Whistleblower and a Bestselling Antidepressant on Trial, won the NASW Science in Society Award in 2009.[3] Side Effects tells the true story of two women who exposed the deception behind the making of a bestselling drug and in doing so, examines financial ties and conflicts of interest among pharmaceutical companies, mental health advocacy groups, doctors, medical journals and the health care industry.[4][5]

Her second nonfiction book, Getting Screwed: Sex Work and the Law,[6] published in October 2015, weaves the true stories of sex workers with the latest research on prostitution. Her book argues that U.S. laws criminalizing prostitution are not only largely ineffective in curbing the sex trade, but create an atmosphere that encourages the exploitation of sex workers and violence against all women.[7]

In 2007, she won an Alicia Patterson Fellowship[8] to write Side Effects, which was published by Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill in 2008.[9]

References

  1. ^ O'Brien, Tim (2019-06-03). "Breaking the Story: Boston Priest Abuse Scandal". O'Brien Communications. Retrieved 2020-12-23.
  2. ^ John, Henly (2010-04-21). "How the Boston Globe exposed the abuse scandal that rocked the Catholic church". The Guardian. Retrieved 2020-12-23.
  3. ^ Cybrarian (September 13, 2001). "2009 Science in Society Awards". National Association of Science Writers. Retrieved August 30, 2015.
  4. ^ Horgan, John (2013-09-23). ""RxISK" Database Reports Side Effects, Including Violence, Undisclosed by Pharma Firms". Scientific American. Retrieved 2020-12-20.
  5. ^ Husten, Larry (2011-09-23). "Former NEJM Editor Criticizes Publication and Peer Review of ARISTOTLE Trial". Forbes. Retrieved 2020-12-20.
  6. ^ "Alison Bass, Professor and Journalist". 2015-05-12. Archived from the original on May 12, 2015. Retrieved 2015-08-30., sexworkandthelaw.com
  7. ^ Ramirez, Stephanie (2015-11-15). "Alison Bass Challenges Common Conceptions Of Sex Work In 'Getting Screwed'". Retrieved 2020-12-23.
  8. ^ Alicia Patterson Journalism Fellowship
  9. ^ Friedman, Richard A. (2009-03-05). "Side Effects: A Prosecutor, a Whistleblower, and a Bestselling Antidepressant on Trial". The New England Journal of Medicine. 358 (26). doi:10.1056/NEJMbkrev0803656. Archived from the original on 2009-03-05. Retrieved 2020-12-27.

External links


Authority control databases
Categories