Sanjay Gupta ( SAHN-jay GOOP-t@; born October 23, 1969) is an American neurosurgeon and medical reporter. He serves as associate chief of the neurosurgery service at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta, Georgia, and as assistant professor of neurosurgery at the Emory University School of Medicine. A media personality on health-related issues, he is best known as CNN's multiple Emmy Award-winning chief medical correspondent, hosting the network's weekend health program Sanjay Gupta, M.D., and making frequent appearances on their American Morning, Larry King Live and Anderson Cooper 360deg programs. His reports from Charity Hospital, New Orleans, Louisiana, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina led to him winning a 2006 Emmy Award for Outstanding Feature Story in a Regularly Scheduled Newscast.

Some journalists and journalism professors specializing in health care have criticized Gupta's coverage. Trudy Lieberman, a regular Nation contributor on healthcare and director of the health and medicine reporting program at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism, reviewed Gupta's "ineptitude" in reporting on the McCain health plan. Lieberman criticized Gupta for relying on insurance industry statistics, and a health expert quoted by Lieberman said that Gupta's reporting "gives a gross oversimplification".  Peter Aldhous criticized Gupta's "enthusiasm for many forms of medical screening - even when the scientific evidence indicates that it may not benefit patients". He and other medical journalists accuse him of a "pro-screening bias" in promoting widespread electrocardiogram and prostate cancer screening, even though medical authorities like the US Preventive Services Task Force recommend against it.  Writing in CounterPunch, Pam Martens criticized Gupta's promotion of Merck's cervical cancer vaccine Gardasil, including repeated assertions that it prevented cervical cancer years before clinical trials had proven that to be true, and without disclosing the financial arrangements between CNN and Merck; she also criticized his downplaying of the risks of Vioxx for cardiovascular events, for which he stated that he drew his conclusions from having "talked to the makers of Vioxx, the Merck company"; and for his involvement in AccentHealth, a health infomercial site that presents itself as patient education and is played in physician waiting rooms and does not in her view adequately disclose its promotional nature.  Gary Schwitzer, professor of health journalism at the University of Minnesota School of Journalism and now an editor at Health News Review, has also criticized Gupta's reporting.

Was the criticism bad or good?