November 12, 2004

Speaker Biographies

Richard S. Cooper is professor and chairman of the Department of Preventive Medicine and Epidemiology at Loyola University’s (Chicago) Stritch School of Medicine. He has written extensively on the issues of ethnicity and disease, coauthoring most famously in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2003 a stinging challenge published of the importance of race and ethnic background in biomedical research and clinical practice, maintaining that the potential for abuse is too great. He has published dozens of articles in the subject, most recently coauthoring "Race and Ethnicity in Clinical Cancer Research" in the Annals of Epidemiology and "Community-Based Search for Hypertension Genes in Whites and Blacks: The GenNet Study" in Genetic Epidemiology.

Jon H. Entine is an adjunct fellow at AEI and scholar in residence at Miami University (Ohio). He writes on genetics, economics, and public policy for academic and popular publications and writes a regular column, "The Ethical Edge," for the London magazine Ethical Corporation. His books include Let Them Eat Precaution: Behind the Agricultural Biotechnology Debate (AEI Press, 2004); Abraham’s Children: How Genetics Is Unlocking the Hidden History of the Bible and the Shared Ancestry of Jews and Christians (Spring 2005); and Taboo: Why Black Athletes Dominate Sports and Why We Are Afraid to Talk about It (PublicAffairs, 2000). He previously wrote and produced news reports and documentaries for ABC, CBS, and NBC News.

Keith C. Ferdinand is professor of clinical pharmacology at Xavier University of New Orleans and former chairman of the American Black Cardiologists. He has authored many journal articles on medical issues and has served on numerous committees examining the nexus of medicine and population. He is also an investigator and steering committee member on the African-American Heart Failure Trial (A-HeFT), the first study that examines whether a unique nitric oxide enhanced heart drug BiDil, made by NitroMed, can help African American heart failure patients survive longer and with a better quality of life.

Vincent Sarich is professor emeritus of anthropology at University of California–Berkeley and was a faculty member at Berkeley from 1966 through 1994, when he took emeritus status. It was for his doctoral dissertation that Mr. Sarich worked out the details of human origin that were to bring him into conflict with the fossil experts of the time. His work showed that the human line went through various stages on the way to bipedalism, and by the mid-1980s, his view had become the acknowledged scientific doctrine. He has written widely on the reality of human differences and language origins. He has authored hundreds of scientific articles and numerous books, his most recent being: Race: The Reality of Human Differences (Westview Press, 2004), coauthored with Frank Miele. He is the 2004 recipient of the Kistler Prize, awarded by the Foundation for the Future to recognize original work investigating the implications of genetics for human society.

Sally Satel is a resident scholar at AEI and staff psychiatrist at the Oasis Clinic in Washington, D.C. She serves on the advisory committee of the Center for Mental Health Services of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration and previously served on the Fowler Commission that investigated sexual misconduct at the U.S. Air Force Academy. Dr. Satel has written widely in academic journals on psychiatry and addiction medicine and has published articles on cultural aspects of medicine and science in many international publications. She is author of PC, M.D.: How Political Correctness Is Corrupting Medicine (Basic Books, 2001) and Drug Treatment: The Case for Coercion (AEI Press, 1999), and coauthor, with Christina Hoff Sommers, of the forthcoming book, One Nation under Therapy (St. Martin’s Press, spring 2005). She has written numerous articles on "race and medicine," including "I am a Racially Profiling Doctor" in the New York Times on May 5, 2002.

Alastair J. J. Wood is assistant vice chancellor and professor of medicine and pharmacology at Vanderbilt University. He has served on various FDA advisory committees and has been the drug therapy editor of the New England Journal of Medicine for over a decade. He was the leading candidate to take over as head of the Food and Drug Administration in 2002 until opposition emerged over his proposals for an independent drug-monitoring board and for switching some prescription drugs to over-the-counter status. He has written extensively on differences in drug reactions in different population groups, including "Racial Differences in the Response to Drugs—Pointers to Genetic Differences" in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2001.

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