Courtesy of Avicenna
Dawn Connelly, senior features editor at The Pharmaceutical Journal, has been named ‘Pharmacy writer of the year’ at the 2024 Avicenna Media Awards.
Announcing the award at a ceremony held at Saddlers’ Hall in central London on 26 January 2024, the judges praised Connelly’s use of science in her three entries, which looked at the reasons behind the huge problems with medicine shortages in the UK; charted the enormous rise in prescribing of ADHD medication over recent years; and analysed the current workforce crisis in community pharmacy.
“Your efforts, using interactive infographics and in-depth reporting on stock shortages raises the profile of the contractor’s plight regarding stock shortages in increasing pressures, both on patients and pharmacies alike,” the judging panel said.
“Your write-up on workforce crisis is even more prevalent now than before. In addition, your report on ADHD puts a nice finishing touch on the evidence you provided.”
Connelly also won ‘Feature of the Year — specialist’ at the British Science Writers’ awards in July 2023 for her feature on parosmia resulting from COVID-19, and was shortlisted for a British Society of Magazine Editors Talent award in the ‘Best use of data journalism’ category in June 2023.
This is the second year in a row that a PJ journalist has won ‘Pharmacy writer of the year’ at the Avicenna Media Awards. Carolyn Wickware, executive editor, won the award in 2023.
“We are really pleased that Dawn has received this recognition,” said Wickware.
“Dawn is a tenacious and versatile journalist, committed to telling the stories behind the headlines in a variety of engaging ways, consistently providing readers with invaluable insights.”
