Marion Downey has specialised in Health Communications for over 30 years. She was editorial director of the medical division of Haymarket Publishing in London, the UK’s largest privately-owned magazine publishing house, and helped launch its medical division in New York. In Australia, she worked as the health writer of the Sydney Morning Herald before moving into public affairs as director of public affairs and marketing at Central Sydney Area Health Service in Camperdown. For the past 10 years, she has headed up communications at the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre at UNSW where she has focused on improving the quality of reporting on drug and alcohol issues. She recalls that when she commenced as a graduate trainee journalist in London in the 1980s people were still smoking at their desk and the two hour booze filled lunch was de rigeur for any aspiring writer or advertising sales manager, so she feels well qualified to lead the discussion about the media and advertising industry’s love affair with alcohol.

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