2003 Science in Society Journalism Awards

Newspaper

Dan Fagin

“Tattered Hopes” series

Newsday

Description:

In the newspaper category, Dan Fagin of Newsday took top honors with his three-part series “Tattered Hopes.” The series took a critical look at how political pressures, activists, and scientists undermined the ambitious $30-million Long Island Breast Cancer Study Project. The series of studies was launched to investigate possible links between pollution and breast cancer. Judges said that “Dan showed what happens when the world of epidemiology collides with public misconceptions and hopes as well as political pressure.” They said the entry was a “thoughtful, well-written, and even-handed look at a highly politicized investigation” and “should be mandatory reading for any journalist setting out to document the passionate voices of scared citizens, the placating intonations of politicians, and the bewildered and bewildering responses of public health officials.”

Biography:

Dan Fagin

Dan Fagin has been Newsday’s environment writer since 1991. An adjunct professor at New York University, where he teaches environmental reporting to journalism graduate students, Fagin is also the current president of the 1,300-member Society of Environmental Journalists, the oldest and largest worldwide association of environmental reporters. He is a co-author of the book Toxic Deception, which in 1997 was named by the group Investigative Reporters and Editors as one of three finalists for IRE’s award for the year’s most outstanding investigative book.

At Newsday, he was one of the principal reporters on a team that was a Pulitzer finalist in 1994 for stories about breast cancer, and he has won numerous awards since then for stories on subjects as diverse as Long Island Sound, cancer clusters, and the restructuring of the electric industry.

A native of Oklahoma City and a 1985 graduate of Dartmouth College, where he was the editor-in-chief of the college newspaper, Fagin previously covered politics and government for Newsday and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune.

He lives in Sea Cliff, NY, with his wife Alison Frankel, a senior writer at American Lawyer Magazine, and their two daughters, Anna and Lily.

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