Public Health

This story is a collaboration between KHN and “Science Friday.” Listen to the conversation between KHN national correspondent Aneri Pattani and John Dankosky, Science Friday’s director of news and radio projects. Rafiah Maxie has been a licensed clinical social worker in the Chicago area for a decade. Throughout that time, she’d viewed suicide as a problem […]

COACHELLA, Calif. — Leoncio Antonio Trejo Galdamez, 58, died in his son’s arms on June 29 after spending the day laying irrigation pipes in California’s Coachella Valley. News of his death reverberated through the largely Latino community near the Mexican and Arizona borders — another casualty in a dangerous business. “Farmworkers are at the front […]

El niño acababa de empezar el jardín de infantes. O, como lo llamaba su madre, “la ruleta rusa”. Eso se debe a que su distrito escolar en Grand Junction, Colorado, experimentó uno de los primeros brotes de la variante delta en la nación la primavera pasada, y ahora las autoridades escolares han relajado las reglas […]

KHN Midwest correspondent Lauren Weber discussed how public health workers are struggling to deal with the pandemic on the “Healthy You: Surviving a Pandemic” podcast on Aug. 12. She also spoke about covid-19 news on WAMU’s “1A” on Aug. 13. Click here to hear Weber on “Health You: Surviving a Pandemic” Click here to hear […]

When the coronavirus hit Martha Leland’s Connecticut nursing home last year, she and dozens of other residents contracted the disease while the facility was on lockdown. Twenty-eight residents died, including her roommate. “The impact of not having friends and family come in and see us for a year was totally devastating,” she said. “And then, […]

The child had just started kindergarten. Or, as her mother called it, “Russian roulette.” That’s because her school district in Grand Junction, Colorado, experienced one of the nation’s first delta-variant outbreaks last spring, and now school officials have loosened the rules meant to protect against covid-19. The mother, Venessa, who asked not to be named […]

The Biden administration’s plans to make covid-19 booster shots available next month has drawn a collective scream of protest from the scientific community. As some scientists see it, the announcement is rash and based on weak evidence, and they worry it could undercut confidence in vaccines with no clear benefit of controlling the pandemic. Meanwhile, […]

President Joe Biden’s edict that nursing homes must ensure their workers are vaccinated against covid-19 presents a challenge for an industry struggling to entice its lowest-paid workers to get shots without driving them to seek employment elsewhere. Although 83% of residents in the average nursing facility are vaccinated, only 61% of a home’s workers are […]

Can’t see the audio player? Click here to listen on PRX. You can also listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Pocket Casts or wherever you listen to podcasts. Click here for a transcript of the episode. As covid-19 cases in the U.S. continue to rise, the Biden administration is countering with new strategies. The latest […]

When he became eligible for the coronavirus vaccine in Illinois, Tom Arnold, 68, said he didn’t need any convincing. He raises cattle, hogs and chickens in Elizabeth, a small town in the state’s northwestern corner. After all, who better to understand why herd immunity matters than a herdsman? “Being a livestock producer, I’m well aware […]