Magazines on wooden table on bright background.

Citational Racism: How Leading Medical Journals Reproduce Segregation in American Medical Knowledge

By Gwendolynne Reid, Cherice Escobar Jones, and Mya Poe

Biases in scholarly citations against scholars of color promote racial inequality, stifle intellectual analysis, and can harm patients and communities.

While the lack of citations to scholars of color in medical journals may be due to carelessness, ignorance, or structural impediments, in some cases it is due to reckless neglect.

Our study demonstrates that the American Medical Association (AMA) has failed to promote greater racial inclusion in its flagship publication, the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), despite an explicit pledge to do so.

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human embryos under a microscope

A Lawsuit Involving an Alabama Man and a Fetus Is Particularly Threatening to Reproductive Rights

Last week Alabama passed the most restrictive abortion law in the country, criminalizing abortion of “any woman known to be pregnant,” with very limited exceptions that do not include rape or incest. But a recent case in Alabama presents an even more threatening challenge to reproductive rights.

In a new paper published in JAMA, the Journal of the American Medical Association, authors Dov FoxEli Y. Adashi, and I. Glenn Cohen, discuss a recent Alabama state court case involving a man suing an abortion clinic and the manufacturer of a pill that enabled his then-girlfriend to terminate her pregnancy at 6 weeks.

In a troubling decision, the court permitted the fetus be a co-plaintiff alongside the man in a “wrongful death” lawsuit. Read More