Synopses & Reviews
A Library Journal Best Consumer Health Book of 2003 and an American Library Association/Booklist Editor’s Choice Book of 2003
“Barbara Seaman is the first prophet of the women’s health movement and her prophecies are still coming true.”—Gloria Steinem
“A wake-up call to women about unquestioningly accepting doctors’ orders.”—Booklist (starred review)
“Lively and impassioned . . . [Seaman] certainly makes her point.”—Gina Kolata, The New York Times
With the ardent tone of a close friend, Barbara Seaman draws on forty years of journalistic research to expose the “menopause industry” and shows how estrogen therapy often causes more problems—including breast cancer, heart attack, and stroke—than it cures. The Greatest Experiment Ever Performed on Women tracks the well-intentioned discovery of synthetic estrogen through the unconscionable and misleading promotion of a dangerous drug.
One of our most tireless health advocates, Barbara Seaman was the co-founder of the National Women’s Health Network and an advanced science writing fellow at Columbia University’s School of Journalism, and had been investigating and writing on synthetic estrogen since before her first groundbreaking book, The Doctor’s Case Against the Pill, was published in 1969.
Synopsis
With the ardent tone of a close friend, Barbara Seaman draws on forty years of journalistic research to expose the "menopause industry" and shows how estrogen therapy often causes more problems—including breast cancer, heart attack, and stroke—than it cures. The Greatest Experiment Ever Performed on Women tracks the well-intentioned discovery of synthetic estrogen through the unconscionable and misleading promotion of a dangerous drug.
Synopsis
Unmasking the "menopause industry."
About the Author
An author, women’s health activist, and energizing influence on hundreds of younger writers and organizers for nearly half a century, the legendary BARBARA SEAMAN (1935-2008) persistently challenged the medical establishment and pharmaceutical companies by exposing their drive for profit at the expense of women. After her first three books, the New York Times wrote that she had "triggered a revolution, fostering a willingness among women to take issues of health into their own hands." As Barbara Ehrenreich wrote about the publication of her first book, The Doctors’ Case Against the Pill (1969): "For many of us, women’s liberation began at that moment." Seaman was a founding advisory board member of and key advisor to Seven Stories Press.