1999 Honorary Member
Joann Rodgers became deputy director of public affairs and director of media relations at the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions in 1984 after 18 years as an award-winning journalist and columnist for the Hearst newspapers. In her post at Hopkins, she is a principal spokesperson for the institutions and deputy director of a 25-person communications and public relations program responsible for all internal and external print, radio and television communications. She has daily responsibility for a 10-person news and information staff, which produces all research and policy news releases and statements. Also at Hopkins, Rodgers spearheaded and now coordinates a major for-profit publishing program that includes The Hopkins Medical Letter,Health After 50 (with 500,000 paid subscribers) and numerous books. She is past president of the Council for the Advancement of Science Writing and the National Association of Science Writers and has served on the national boards of the American Heart Association and the Alan Guttmacher Institute. A frequent contributor to science and general interest magazines, she is the author of six books, a frequent lecturer on the public understanding of science and has received many professional honors, including awards from the Lasker Foundation, the Kidney Foundation and the American Medical Association, among others.