ABSTRACT
This chapter considers the ability of science journalists to comment on research that emerges from world's laboratories and research institutions. Journalism not only reports on events, it shapes them too; something which is perhaps most obvious in politics. The shaping of public opinion is also key to another important branch of journalism: criticism. Few years ago Steve Rayner, then director of Economic and Social Research Council's 'Science in Society' programme, convened a workshop to ask whether science needed a new type of intermediaries too, namely 'scientific connoisseurs'. Financial journalists can have a significant impact on businesses, not just by reporting on actions of a company, which can affect the price of its stock, but by opining on strategy and the competence of business leaders. In 1998 Dr Andrew Wakefield of Royal London Hospital gave a press conference in which he told the media of his concern that the Measles, Mumps and Rubella (MMR) vaccine causes incidences of autism in children.
