Health & Safety

Janice Jernigans, 75, of St. Louis' Hyde Park neighborhood, signs a petition for a Missouri constitutional amendment that would legalize abortion up until fetal viability on Feb. 6 at The Pageant in St. Louis.

Missouri advocates gather signatures for abortion legalization, but GOP hurdle looms

12:20pm February 28, 2024

by Jason Rosenbaum

Missouri has one of the strictest abortion bans in the U.S. Abortion rights supporters have until May to gather over 171,000 signatures to have the issue appear before voters this fall.

Queue Listen Now

Republican Arizona Senate candidate Kari Lake speaks at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Saturday, Feb. 24. Lake has softened her stance on abortion as the campaign season moves forward.

In Arizona, abortion politics are already playing out on the Senate campaign trail

11:48am February 28, 2024

by Ben Giles

Abortion proved to be a major issue in the 2022 midterms and again in 2023. This year, the presidential race puts extra attention on the ballot. In Arizona, that means the issue is front and center.

The effort to legalize abortion in Missouri

9:27pm February 27, 2024

by Jason Rosenbaum

Missouri has one of the strictest abortion bans, with no exceptions for rape or incest. Abortion rights advocates aim to get a ballot initiative legalizing the procedure in front of voters this year.

Queue Listen Now

How gerontology, the study of aging, came to be

4:55pm February 27, 2024

NPR's history podcast Throughline tells us the story of the scientist who helped launch gerontology, the study of aging, and how we started viewing aging as a disease.

Florida's response to a measles outbreak endangers children, experts say

4:28pm February 27, 2024

by Pien Huang

A measles outbreak in a Florida elementary school flummoxes public health experts, who say the state surgeon general's response contradicts established public health measures to contain the virus.

Senator Tammy Duckworth says she has been trying to build bipartisan support for IVF access for years.

After Alabama's ruling, this senator's bill aims to protect national access to IVF

4:28pm February 27, 2024

Senator Tammy Duckworth has introduced a bill to protect access to IVF. She tells NPR about her own experience with fertility treatments and her attempts to build bipartisan support for her bill.

A 7-month-old child with diarrhea lies in a bed at a hospital in India. Oral rehydration salts are a cheap and effective treatment but are underused. A new study aims to find out why.

Health & Safety

There's a cheap and effective way to treat childhood diarrhea. So why is it underused?

1:24pm February 27, 2024

by Kamala Thiagarajan

A new study seeks to find the reasons that health-care personnel avoid the easy treatment for this potentially life-threatening condition.

The $1 billion donation from Ruth Gottesman to the Albert Einstein College of Medicine is one of the largest-ever charitable gifts to an educational institution in the United States.

Tuition will be free at a New York City medical school thanks to a $1 billion gift

11:29am February 27, 2024

by Ayana Archie

Ruth Gottesman is a professor emerita of pediatrics at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City. Gottesman's late husband, David, left the money to her upon his death.

Health & Safety

NCDHHS partners with federal programs to address inequities in sickle cell disease treatment

10:17am February 27, 2024

by Neal Charnoff

North Carolina is teaming with the federal government to strengthen access to new sickle cell disease therapies.

The $81,739.40 bill for her mother's air-ambulance ride arrived less than two weeks after she died, Alicia Wieberg said.

Health & Safety

Her air-ambulance ride wasn't covered by Medicare. It will cost her family $81,739

9:27am February 27, 2024

A frugal Tennessee resident opted out of Medicare Part B, which carries $175 monthly premiums. Now her heirs face a huge bill for an air-ambulance ride.