Popular health columnist to speak at URI ‘Women as Consumers of Health Care’ is topic KINGSTON, R.I. — March 14, 2001 — Abigail Trafford, renowned columnist for The Washington Post, will speak at the University of Rhode Island on Wednesday, April 4. Her talk is free and open to the public. Trafford will speak about “Women as Consumers of Health Care” at 7 p.m. in Quinn Auditorium. Her talk is the 21st annual Fredrika Schweers Memorial Lecture on Women and Health offered by URI. Trafford’s popular and informative weekly column for The Post is called “Second Opinion.” From 1986 until 2000, she was the editor of The Post’s weekly health section, covering medicine, health care, lifestyle issues, and social trends. Before going to that newspaper, she wrote and edited for U.S. News & World Report and was an assistant managing editor. From 1968 to 1974, she worked as a stringer for Time Magazine and The Washington Post covering the Apollo space program in Houston. Trafford is author of Crazy Time: Surviving Divorce and Building a New Life, published by HarperCollins. The evening is sponsored by the URI Women’s Studies Program. For Information: Janet Hagen, 874-5150, Jan Sawyer, 874-2116