Pandemics are unpredictable and it is too soon to say, argues Richard Smith […]
Richard Smith
Richard Smith was the editor of The BMJ until 2004.
Richard Smith: Relearning how to die
Kevin Toolis, author of the beautiful My Father’s Wake, would agree with the surgeon Atul Gawande that we have forgotten how to die. Toolis’s core argument is that his forebears […]
Richard Smith: The faults and dangers of an iatrocracy
The first thing that struck Bernard-Henri Lévy, arguably France’s leading public intellectual, about the covid-19 pandemic was the rise of “medical power.” In his short, enjoyable, and provocative book The […]
What to say to a 7 year old terrified by climate change?
How can we support children who are worried about climate change? Richard Smith, David Pencheon, and Frances Mortimer look at how we might find hope through action […]
Richard Smith: Medical schools move to teaching online consultation with patients
As for everybody and every organisation, the covid-19 pandemic has presented challenges, but also opportunities, to medical schools. One challenge is how the schools can ensure adequate and safe contact […]
Pharmaceutical companies should publish more research open access
Many organisations are working towards making scientific publications more transparent, discoverable, accessible, and accountable, but wouldn’t it be better if all these organisations could work together? In June, Open Pharma, […]
Richard Smith: The well known story of how Easter Islanders destroyed their island is probably wrong
In 2011, I posted an article in The BMJ “Will we follow Easter Islanders into extinction?” It was a deeply pessimistic piece, and now I need to correct it with […]
Taking a covid-19 test at home: the fragile base on which track-and-trace is built
Like millions of others every day I have “done my bit” by entering into an app my symptoms and whether I’ve had a test for covid-19, and day after day […]
Richard Smith: Will carbon consumption, cost, and severe limitations finish paper journals?
The demise of most medical journals and the transformation of the remaining rump has been predicted for years, not least in my book The Trouble With Medical Journals, which I […]
Richard Smith: The perplexing pursuit of an economy that promotes wellbeing not growth
Our economy, said John Maynard Keynes in 1933, “is not a success. It is not intelligent, it is not beautiful, it is not just, it is not virtuous—and it doesn’t […]