About the author

Simon Chapman in 2016. Photo by Trish Kirby.

Simon Chapman AO is emeritus professor in public health at the University of Sydney. He has won the World Health Organization’s medal for tobacco control (1998), the American Cancer Society’s Luther Terry Award for outstanding individual leadership in tobacco control (2003), and was the NSW Premier’s Cancer Researcher of the Year (2008). In 2013 he was made an Officer in the Order of Australia for his contributions to public health and named 2013 Australian Skeptic of the Year. In 2014, the Australian right-wing think tank, the Institute of Public Affairs, named him as one of Australia’s Dirty Dozen all-time “opponents of freedom”.