Harriet A. Washington is an American writer and medical ethicist. She is the author of the book ''

Medical Apartheid ''Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present'' is a 2007 book by Harriet A. Washington. It is a history of medical experimentation on African Americans. From the era of sl ...

'', which won the 2007

environmental racism Environmental racism or ecological apartheid is a form of institutional racism leading to landfills, incinerators, and hazardous waste disposal being disproportionally placed in communities of colour. Internationally, it is also associated with ...

and the erosion of informed consent in medicine. Washington has been a fellow in ethics at the

Harvard Medical School Harvard Medical School (HMS) is the graduate medical school of Harvard University and is located in the Longwood Medical Area of Boston, Massachusetts. Founded in 1782, HMS is one of the oldest medical schools in the United States and is consi ...

, a fellow at the

Harvard School of Public Health The Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health is the public health school of Harvard University, located in the Longwood Medical Area of Boston, Massachusetts. The school grew out of the Harvard- MIT School for Health Officers, the nation's firs ...

, and a senior research scholar at the National Center for Bioethics at

Tuskegee University Tuskegee University (Tuskegee or TU), formerly known as the Tuskegee Institute, is a private, historically black land-grant university in Tuskegee, Alabama. It was founded on Independence Day in 1881 by the state legislature. The campus was de ...

Career

Washington was Health and Science editor of the Rochester '' Democrat and Chronicle''. In 1990, she was awarded the New Horizons Traveling Fellowship by the Council for the Advancement of Science Writing. She subsequently worked as a Page One editor at ''

USA Today ''USA Today'' (stylized in all uppercase) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth on September 15, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headquarters in Tysons, Virgi ...

'' newspaper, before winning a fellowship from the

. In 1997, she won a John S. Knight Fellowship at Stanford University, and in 2002 was named a

research fellow A research fellow is an academic research position at a university or a similar research institution, usually for academic staff or faculty members. A research fellow may act either as an independent investigator or under the supervision of a pr ...

in medical ethics at

. In 2007, Washington's third book, ''

'' won the 2007

National Book Critics Circle Award The National Book Critics Circle Awards are a set of annual American literary awards by the National Book Critics Circle (NBCC) to promote "the finest books and reviews published in English". The book has been described as "the first and only comprehensive history of medical experimentation on African Americans." In 2019, she published ''A Terrible Thing to Waste: Environmental Racism and Its Assault on the American Mind'', which explores how poor people of color disproportionately suffer from environmental disasters and exposure to environmental toxins, including

lead Lead is a chemical element with the symbol Pb (from the Latin ) and atomic number 82. It is a heavy metal that is denser than most common materials. Lead is soft and malleable, and also has a relatively low melting point. When freshly cu ...

arsenic Arsenic is a chemical element with the symbol As and atomic number 33. Arsenic occurs in many minerals, usually in combination with sulfur and metals, but also as a pure elemental crystal. Arsenic is a metalloid. It has various allotropes, ...

, mercury, and

DDT Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane, commonly known as DDT, is a colorless, tasteless, and almost odorless crystalline chemical compound, an organochloride. Originally developed as an insecticide, it became infamous for its environmental impacts. ...

. Exposure to these chemicals impairs

brain development The development of the nervous system, or neural development (neurodevelopment), refers to the processes that generate, shape, and reshape the nervous system of animals, from the earliest stages of embryonic development to adulthood. The fiel ...

and can lead to lower IQ. Washington was a visiting scholar at the

DePaul University College of Law The DePaul University College of Law is the professional graduate law school of DePaul University in Chicago. The College of Law’s facilities encompass nine floors across two buildings, with features such as the Vincent G. Rinn Law Library and ...

and is now a Bennett Fellow at the Black Mountain Institute of the University of Las Vegas at Nevada. Washington has been interviewed by

NPR National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other ...

and ''

Democracy Now! ''Democracy Now!'' is an hour-long American TV, radio, and Internet news program hosted by journalists Amy Goodman (who also acts as the show's executive producer), Juan González, and Nermeen Shaikh. The show, which airs live each weekday at ...

''.

Selected bibliography

* * * * * * *

Personal life

Washington was born in Fort Dix,

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

. She graduated from the

University of Rochester The University of Rochester (U of R, UR, or U of Rochester) is a private university, private research university in Rochester, New York. The university grants Undergraduate education, undergraduate and graduate degrees, including Doctorate, do ...

in 1976 with a B.A. in English literature and later completed an M.A. in journalism at the

Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism The Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism is located in Pulitzer Hall on the university's Morningside Heights campus in New York City. Founded in 1912 by Joseph Pulitzer, Columbia Journalism School is one of the oldest journalism s ...

. Washington lives in

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

. She was married to Ron DeBose from 1992 until his death in 2013.

References

External links

*
Harriet A. Washington biography
by

Penguin Random House Penguin Random House LLC is an Anglo-American multinational conglomerate publishing company formed on July 1, 2013, from the merger of Penguin Group and Random House. On April 2, 2020, Bertelsmann announced the completion of its purchase ...

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Washington, Harriet A. 1951 births Living people American medical writers Women medical writers PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles Literary Award winners 20th-century American women writers 21st-century American women writers Writers from New Jersey People from Fort Dix University of Rochester alumni Writers from Manhattan 20th-century American non-fiction writers 21st-century American non-fiction writers Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism alumni Columbia University faculty African-American women writers American women academics 20th-century African-American women 20th-century African-American writers 21st-century African-American women 21st-century African-American writers