Robert Whitaker

Robert Whitaker has been reporting on science and medicine for nearly 15 years.  He first worked as a science/medical writer at the Albany Times Union, in Albany New York.  Later, he was Director of Publications at Harvard Medical School, and in 1994, he co-founded a company called CenterWatch, which covered the business aspects of the clinical testing of new drugs.  He sold CenterWatch in 1998, partly in order to write Mad in America.  His articles on the mentally ill and the drug industry have won several awards, including the George Polk Award for medical writing, and the National Association of Science Writer's Award for best magazine article.  A series he co-wrote for the Boston Globe on psychiatric research was named a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 1998.