Norman Swan

Norman was one of the first medically qualified journalists in the country. Best known for his wide broadcasting experience including the award-winning Health Report for ABC Radio National, Dr Norman Swan also hosted Life Matters for Radio National and more recently Health Dimensions on ABC Television. The high profile show The Health Report is a weekly programme dealing with topical medical and health issues for a general audience. The programme won Gold Medals at two New York International Radio Festivals. Health Dimensions also focuses on consumer health, while Life Matters covers social issues, relationships and education.

Norman was born in Scotland, graduated in medicine from the University of Aberdeen and later obtained his postgraduate qualifications in Paediatrics. Joining the Australian Broadcasting Corporation in 1982, Norman has won numerous awards for his journalism and broadcasting.

A famous example of Norman's work is his much publicised and controversial investigative program on scientific fraud and the well-known gynaecologist Dr William McBride. The program exposed fraudulent research, sending shock waves throughout the medical world and led to Dr William McBride being de-registered. It earned Dr Swan the 1988 Australian Writers' Guild Award for best documentary and a Gold Walkley.

In 2004 he was awarded the Medal of the Australian Academy of Science, an honour that had only been given three times and the Royal College of Physicians of Glasgow made him a Fellow. In 2006 he was given a doctorate of Medicine Hon Causa by the University of Sydney during its medical school's 150th anniversary.

On television, in addition to two major documentary series shown internationally, Dr Swan has hosted Quantum, been a guest reporter on Catalyst and Four Corners and hosted Health Dimensions on ABC Television.

Norman Swan is well known internationally. He has been the Australian correspondent for the Journal of the American Medical Association and the British Medical Journal and consults for the World Health Organisation in Geneva. In late 2008 Norman chaired a meeting of the world's Health Ministers in West Africa which aimed to pursue the goal of making health policy evidence-based and is facilitating a follow up meeting in Singapore in October 2009.

Now Swan could be approaching the zenith of his career: he has been appointed health adviser to the TV reality show 'The Biggest Loser'.