Simon Chapman (academic)

Last updated

Simon Chapman
Born
Simon Fenton Chapman

14 December 1951
Bowral
NationalityAustralian
OccupationPublic Health Academic
Known forAnti-tobacco Activism
AwardsWorld Health Organization's World No Tobacco Day Medal (1997) National Heart Foundation of Australia's gold medal (1999)

Simon Fenton Chapman, AO (born 14 December 1951) is an Australian academic and tobacco control activist.

Contents

Life and career

Chapman was born in Bowral, New South Wales to Margaret and Alec Chapman who had emigrated from England in 1948. He is an Emeritus Professor in Public Health at the University of Sydney. [1] In his PhD in social medicine he examined the semiotics of cigarette advertising. [2] He has authored 21 books and major reports, 338 papers and editorials, and 198 letters and commentaries in peer reviewed journals.

Chapman is a regular writer on public health matters in leading Australian newspapers and blogs, having written some 470 opinion page and journalistic articles since 1981. [3] His main research interests are in tobacco control, media discourses on health and illness, and risk communication. He taught annual courses in Public Health Advocacy and Tobacco Control in the University of Sydney's MPH program. He wrote a regular column, Smoke Signals, on public health matters for The Conversation [4] from January 2015-August 2017 which by February 2022 had been read 3.6 million times. He blogs at simonchapman6.com

In 1997 Chapman won the World Health Organization's World No Tobacco Day Medal; in 1999, the National Heart Foundation of Australia's gold medal; in 2006 the Thoracic Society of Australia & New Zealand President's Award. [5] In 2003 he was voted by his international peers to be awarded the American Cancer Society's Luther L. Terry Award for outstanding individual leadership in tobacco control. [6] In 2005, his research on the tobacco industry was selected by the National Health and Medical Research Council as being one of its "top 10" projects. He was foundational deputy editor of the British Medical Journal's specialist journal, Tobacco Control from 1992 to 1998, and its editor from 1999 to 2008. He was Tobacco Control's commissioning editor for Low and Middle Income Countries from 2008 to 2010 and is now editor emeritus.

Chapman studied health complaints regarding wind farms in Australia in 2012 and concluded the complaints were likely to be the result of nocebo effects. [7] [8]

In 2008 he was awarded the $50,000 NSW Premier's award for Cancer Researcher of the Year, voted to become a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia, won the Public Health Association of Australia's Sidney Sax medal, [9] and was included in the Sydney Morning Herald's Sydney Magazine list of 100 of Sydney's most influential people. He appeared in that magazine's list again in 2012. In 2013 he was given a Distinguished Professorial Award by the faculty of Medicine at the University of Sydney and made an Honorary Fellow of the Faculty of Public Health of the Royal College of Physicians (UK).

Simon Chapman is a life member of the Australian Consumers' Association and was its chairman 1999–2002. He served on the board of The Cancer Council New South Wales for nine years until 2006. He was a key member of the Coalition for Gun Control which won the 1996 Australian Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission's Community Human Rights award for its advocacy for gun law reform after the Port Arthur massacre in 1996. The Australian Skeptics Inc conferred on him the award of Australian Skeptic of the Year in 2013. [10]

He was a staff elected Fellow of Senate, [11] at the University of Sydney from 2007 to 2011. He was a board member of Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) from 1996 to 2013.

He was lead singer with a Sydney-based rock covers band, the Original Faux Pas, [12] from 2007 to 2012 and then with The Bleeding Hearts. [13]

In November 2019, he directed the inaugural St.Anmoré (Stanmore) Festival of Music to honour the late conductor and musical educator Richard Gill AO. He was awarded senior citizen of the year 2020 by Sydney's Inner West Council.

Chapman was made an Officer (AO) in the General Division of the Order of Australia on 10 June 2013. [14]

He retired in January 2016 and was awarded Emeritus Professor status by the University of Sydney commencing 2016. [15]

In December 2017, Public Health England accused him of presenting factual errors during a Federal Government Enquiry [16] His full reply to these claims was published in Hansard (submission 313.1 [17]

Selected books

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cigarette</span> Small roll of cut tobacco designed to be smoked

A cigarette is a narrow cylinder containing a combustible material, typically tobacco, that is rolled into thin paper for smoking. The cigarette is ignited at one end, causing it to smolder; the resulting smoke is orally inhaled via the opposite end. Cigarette smoking is the most common method of tobacco consumption. The term cigarette, as commonly used, refers to a tobacco cigarette, but the word is sometimes used to refer to other substances, such as a cannabis cigarette or a herbal cigarette. A cigarette is distinguished from a cigar by its usually smaller size, use of processed leaf, and paper wrapping, which is typically white.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tobacco smoking</span> Practice of burning tobacco and breathing the resulting smoke

Tobacco smoking is the practice of burning tobacco and ingesting the resulting smoke. The smoke may be inhaled, as is done with cigarettes, or simply released from the mouth, as is generally done with pipes and cigars. The practice is believed to have begun as early as 5000–3000 BC in Mesoamerica and South America. Tobacco was introduced to Eurasia in the late 17th century by European colonists, where it followed common trade routes. The practice encountered criticism from its first import into the Western world onwards but embedded itself in certain strata of a number of societies before becoming widespread upon the introduction of automated cigarette-rolling apparatus.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Smoking ban</span> Law prohibiting tobacco smoking in a given space

Smoking bans, or smoke-free laws, are public policies, including criminal laws and occupational safety and health regulations, that prohibit tobacco smoking in certain spaces. The spaces most commonly affected by smoking bans are indoor workplaces and buildings open to the public such as restaurants, bars, office buildings, schools, retail stores, hospitals, libraries, transport facilities, and government buildings, in addition to public transport vehicles such as aircraft, buses, watercraft, and trains. However, laws may also prohibit smoking in outdoor areas such as parks, beaches, pedestrian plazas, college and hospital campuses, and within a certain distance from the entrance to a building, and in some cases, private vehicles and multi-unit residences.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Passive smoking</span> Inhalation of tobacco smoke by persons other than the intended active smoker

Passive smoking is the inhalation of tobacco smoke, called passive smoke, secondhand smoke (SHS) or environmental tobacco smoke (ETS), by individuals other than the active smoker. It occurs when tobacco smoke diffuses into the surrounding atmosphere as an aerosol pollutant, which leads to its inhalation by nearby bystanders within the same environment. Exposure to secondhand tobacco smoke causes many of the same diseases caused by active smoking, although to a lower prevalence due to the reduced concentration of smoke that enters the airway.

Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) is the name of a number of autonomous pressure groups (charities) in the anglosphere that seek to publicize the risks associated with tobacco smoking and campaign for greater restrictions on use and on cigarette and tobacco sales.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arthur Chesterfield-Evans</span> Australian

Arthur Chesterfield-Evans is an Australian medical practitioner and politician who served as a member of the Legislative Council of New South Wales from 1998 to 2007.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">A Frank Statement</span> Tobacco advertisement

A Frank Statement to Cigarette Smokers was a historic first advertisement in a campaign run by major American tobacco companies on January 4, 1954, to create doubt by disputing recent scientific studies linking smoking cigarettes to lung cancer and other dangerous health effects.

Yang Tingzhong is a scholar in social and behavior sciences, a population behaviorist, and sociologist in health.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tobacco politics</span> Politics surrounding the use and distribution of tobacco

Tobacco politics refers to the politics surrounding the use and distribution of tobacco.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tobacco control</span> Field of health science

Tobacco control is a field of international public health science, policy and practice dedicated to addressing tobacco use and thereby reducing the morbidity and mortality it causes. Since most cigarettes and cigars and hookahs contain/use tobacco, tobacco control also concerns these. E-cigarettes do not contain tobacco itself, but (often) do contain nicotine. Tobacco control is a priority area for the World Health Organization (WHO), through the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. References to a tobacco control movement may have either positive or negative connotations, depending upon the commentator.

Wind turbine syndrome and wind farm syndrome are terms for the alleged medical condition related to the proximity of wind turbines. Proponents claim that these effects include congenital abnormality, cancer, vertigo, nausea, autism, ADHD, death, tinnitus, stress, fatigue, memory loss, attention deficit, migraines and sleep deprivation. for which there is no scientific backing. The distribution of recorded events, however, correlates with media coverage of wind farm syndrome itself, and not with the presence or absence of wind farms. Neither term is recognised by any international disease classification system, nor do they appear in any title or abstract in the United States National Library of Medicine's PubMed database. Wind turbine syndrome has been characterized as pseudoscience.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Plain tobacco packaging</span> Legally mandated packaging of tobacco products without any brand imagery

Plain tobacco packaging, also known as generic, neutral, standardised or homogeneous packaging, is packaging of tobacco products, typically cigarettes, without any branding, including only the brand name in a mandated size, font and place on the pack, in addition to the health warnings and any other legally mandated information such as toxic constituents and tax-paid stamps. The appearance of all tobacco packs is standardised, including the colour of the pack.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cancer Council Victoria</span>

Cancer Council Victoria is a not-for-profit organisation which aims to reduce the impact of cancer in Victoria. It is an independent body that advises various groups, including government, on cancer-related issues. Cancer Council Victoria also conducts and funds cancer research, acts as an advocate for cancer patients and their families, and runs cancer prevention, education and support programs.

The Waubra Foundation is an Australian lobby that opposes wind farms and promotes the controversial wind turbine syndrome. The foundation was created by Peter Mitchell, a director of several oil and gas companies. The foundation describes itself as an advocacy group for properly conducted, multidisciplinary research into alleged health problems reported by people living in the vicinity of wind turbines and other industrial uses. The foundation is named after the town of Waubra, Victoria Australia, but is not linked to it in any other way. The town is home to the 128 turbines at Waubra Wind Farm.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ken Harvey (professor)</span> Australian public health doctor

Kenneth John Harvey AM is an Australian public health doctor, currently Honorary Adjunct Associate Professor at the Institute for Evidence-Based Healthcare in Bond University. Described by The Age as an "anti-quackery crusader", Harvey is an advocate of evidence-based medicine and a critic of pharmaceutical marketing and unproven diet products. He is the president of Friends of Science in Medicine. In 2017, Harvey was awarded a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for his "significant service to community health and the pharmaceutical industry”.

Smoking in Australia is restricted in enclosed public places, workplaces, in areas of public transport and near underage events, except new laws in New South Wales that ban smoking within ten metres of children's play spaces.

James Frank Bishop is an Australian doctor and the Chief Medical Officer of Australia between 2009 and 2011.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Emily Banks</span> Epidemiologist and public health researcher

Emily Banks is an Australian epidemiologist and public health physician, working mainly on chronic disease. She is a Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health and Head of the Centre for Public Health Data and Policy at the Australian National University, and a visiting professor at the University of Oxford.

Kristin Carson-Chahhoud is an associate professor at the University of South Australia, heading a research group in the Adelaide Medical School. Specialising in respiratory medicine, tobacco control and management of tobacco-related illnesses, Carson aims to close the gap between clinical research trials and real-world patient care.

References

  1. ↑ "Professor Simon Chapman - The University of Sydney". Medfac.usyd.edu.au. Retrieved 15 April 2015.
  2. ↑ "The University of Sydney School of Public Health". The University of Sydney.
  3. ↑ "Curriculum vitae: Simon Chapman". University of Sydney . Retrieved 4 February 2021.
  4. ↑ "The Conversation - online journal".
  5. ↑ "President's Award" (PDF). www.thoracic.org.au. 26 November 2014. Archived from the original (PDF) on 4 March 2015. Retrieved 26 June 2023.
  6. ↑ "2003 Luther L. Terry Award Winners". cancer.org.
  7. ↑ Chapman, Simon; St. George, Alexis; Waller, Karen; Cakic, Vince (2013). "The Pattern of Complaints about Australian Wind Farms Does Not Match the Establishment and Distribution of Turbines: Support for the Psychogenic, 'Communicated Disease' Hypothesis". PLOS One . 8 (10): e76584. Bibcode:2013PLoSO...876584C. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0076584 . ISSN   1932-6203. PMC   3797792 . PMID   24146893.
  8. ↑ Lenore Taylor (15 March 2013). "Wind turbine sickness 'all in the mind': study". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 22 October 2015.
  9. ↑ "Sidney Sax Public Health Medal". Phaa.net.au. Archived from the original on 31 December 2012. Retrieved 16 April 2015.
  10. ↑ "Chiropractors win joint Bent Spoon". Australian Skeptics Inc. 25 November 2013. Retrieved 22 October 2015.
  11. ↑ "Current Fellows of Senate - Senate - The University of Sydney". Usyd.edu.au. Retrieved 15 April 2015.
  12. ↑ "The Original Faux Pas". Facebook.com. Retrieved 15 April 2015.
  13. ↑ "The Bleeding Hearts". Facebook.com. Retrieved 15 April 2015.
  14. ↑ "Queen's Birthday honours list 2013". The Sydney Morning Herald. 10 June 2013. Retrieved 10 June 2013.
  15. ↑ "Award-winner Prof Simon Chapman retires". Australian Skeptics Inc. 30 April 2015. Retrieved 22 October 2015.
  16. ↑ "Subscribe to the Australian | Newspaper home delivery, website, iPad, iPhone & Android apps".
  17. ↑ corporateName=Commonwealth Parliament; address=Parliament House, Canberra. "Submissions". aph.gov.au.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  18. ↑ Wind turbine syndrome: a communicated disease. Sydney University Press. 2017. ISBN   9781743324998 . Retrieved 25 February 2018.
  19. ↑ "Smoke signals:selected writing". Ses.library.usyd.edu.au. Retrieved 17 March 2017.
  20. ↑ "SUP eStore :: Let sleeping dogs lie? What men should know before getting tested for prostate cancer". Purl.library.usyd.edu.au. Retrieved 15 April 2015.
  21. ↑ The Sydney eScholarship Repository: Over our dead bodies: Port Arthur and Australia's fight for gun control. Ses.library.usyd.edu.au. 14 February 2013. ISBN   9781743320310 . Retrieved 15 April 2015.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.