In March, the National Sleep Foundation, a nonprofit based in Washington, D.C., released the results of its annual poll, Sleep in America. The survey reported some worrisome statistics: More than half of adults have in the past year driven at least once while drowsy. And 20 percent—up from 13 percent in 2001—report sleeping less than six hours a night. The foundation's motto, according to its website, is "Waking America to the Importance of Sleep." And who could argue with that? As it does every year, the foundation's survey led to widespread news reports about how the modern American lifestyle leads to levels of sleep deprivation and insomnia that are harmful to our health.

I'm extremely pro-sleep and I'd very much like more of it in my life. So I think it's great that these dedicated folks are advocating on its behalf. But if an organization sponsoring a poll about the dangers of disordered sleep has also received extensive backing from the makers of sleeping pills, I'd like to be told—by the journalists who tell me about the poll itself. It certainly doesn't mean the results are wrong or the poll is methodologically flawed. But let's be clear: The findings of the Sleep in America survey will not hurt the prospects of the many corporations that have donated to the National Sleep Foundation—such as Sepracor and Sanofi-Aventis, makers of the blockbuster sleeping medications Lunesta and Ambien.

This reportorial slip is fairly typical in health journalism. The story that overlooks quiet corporate support for organizations whose purportedly disinterested research generates evidence that—surprise!—bolsters the financial interests of the sponsors. And this kind of unquestioning, gee-whiz method of health reporting is all too common these days. News stories routinely tout the latest advances in medical technology and drugs without also informing us of the costs, the possibility of unpleasant side effects, or whether the company selling the product is funding the research.

It's a problem whenever reporters fail to ask the kinds of probing questions that few bothered to pose to the National Sleep Foundation. But it's particularly troubling right now, when health care reform—and after that, the multi-year process of implementing that reform—looms so large on the national agenda.

The last time we experienced the elusive possibility of reform, at the start of the Clinton era, everyone flubbed it. Hillary alienated the political universe with her Kremlin-esque approach to policy making. And her 1,400-page, take-it-or-leave-it master plan confused journalists as much as everyone else. So the public debate was dominated by the plight of Harry and Louise (the middle-class couple who fretted in a series of TV ads that Hillary's approach would rob them of free choice in decisions about health care), which doomed the effort. It didn't matter that Harry and Louise were fictional characters created by the insurance industry opposing Hillary's efforts, or that the couple's concerns were based on lies and distortions.

A recent survey sponsored by the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Association of Health Care Journalists, a 10-year-old organization, details the current challenges facing health journalism—and its practitioners—in the United States. More than 90 percent of the 256 association members who responded to the survey reported that financial pressures at media outlets were undermining the quality of health news coverage. Only 16 percent said that the number of reporters specializing in health had increased at their organization during their employment, compared with 40 percent who said the number had declined. And almost 40 percent predicted that their job would be axed within a few years.

For an accompanying report, Gary Schwitzer, a professor of health journalism at the University of Minnesota who is founding editor of MayoClinic.com and publisher of healthnewsreview.org, which analyzes and grades health-related news stories, interviewed health journalists at media outlets across the country. He found that cutbacks in the ranks of health and science reporters at many traditional news organizations have placed enormous pressures on those who remain.

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