Health

July 28, 2022

How a Covid-19 testing company accused of sloppiness, fraud and profiteering kept expanding

GS Labs spread across the country with the promise of reliable, convenient Covid testing. An APM Reports investigation finds that the company has at times delivered inaccurate results, faced backlogs, charged high prices, and pushed customers into unnecessary tests. Frustrated state and local government officials have often been powerless to address the complaints.

August 19, 2021

Inside the college mental health crisis

Colleges are struggling to meet the surging demand for mental health services on campus, and some schools are wrestling with how much care they owe students.

July 21, 2021

Lax oversight, no-bid contracts and mysterious pricing: Inside the black box of Covid testing

More than a year into the pandemic, many details about Covid testing remain unclear to the public, including how much the tests will cost taxpayers and how effective they really are. Nowhere is that more evident than in Minnesota.

June 15, 2021

At the height of pandemic, Kentucky’s Democratic governor eased Covid restrictions despite mounting deaths

An investigation finds that when Gov. Andy Beshear rolled back restrictions in December, health officials were already worried about a surge and were overwhelmed by a growing backlog of deaths.

January 13, 2021

Thousands of public housing residents live near the most polluted places in the nation — and the government has done little to protect them

An investigation reveals that more than 9,000 federally subsidized housing properties sit within a mile of a Superfund site, and the government has failed to inform many residents of the potential threats they face. As a result, low-income renters are paying for government inaction with their health.

July 29, 2020

On the Navajo Nation, college students navigate a curfew and digital dead zones

The pandemic is making getting through college harder for students on the wrong side of the digital divide. In rural Arizona, when campuses closed, some students couldn’t log on from home, because they had no access to the internet. A local sheriff flew laptops and hotspots to community college students on the Navajo Nation.

July 29, 2020

Some colleges that weathered the Great Depression and two world wars won't survive Covid-19

The long tradition of students attending small, residential liberal arts colleges around the country was already shaky before the pandemic. Students are choosing less expensive options and more practical degrees. Experts warn that 10 percent of American colleges — about 200 or more institutions — are on the verge of going under. The pandemic is accelerating that trend.

July 29, 2020

Coronavirus disrupts higher education, magnifies inequities and accelerates change

An audio documentary from APM Reports.

July 29, 2020

A Florida university plans to reopen with a mandatory screening app, fewer people in classrooms, and a pilot study of virus-sniffing dogs

Colleges and universities are under pressure to reopen, but bringing students back on campus safely means dealing with dizzying logistics. As the virus surges in Miami, a large commuter campus gets ready.

July 23, 2020

A national forewarning: Wisconsin's high absentee volume and ballot errors

Voters there missed the fine print and the elections staff was overwhelmed. As November nears, a by-mail vote surge — due to virus safety — will spotlight the ballot counting in other presidential battleground states with slim voting margins.

July 15, 2020

How Washington, D.C., mishandled its response to the coronavirus

In a city with some of the most glaring health disparities in the country, District officials were slow to help Black residents deal with the pandemic.

June 11, 2020

Episode 6: Delta State

College football is practically a religion in Mississippi. And for the players, it's life. As Covid-19 upended their world, the teammates at Delta State struggled to find structure and purpose for an off-season like no other.

May 28, 2020

Episode 5: Geno

As the coronavirus swept into the Mississippi Delta, a judge in the small city of Indianola decided to release every inmate she had in jail. That is, every inmate except one.

May 26, 2020

11 highlights from our investigation into the dangers of lead pipes

Current and former EPA scientists say the Trump administration is pushing rule changes that could leave Americans exposed to lead in drinking water.

May 21, 2020

Episode 4: Watermelon Slim

In the middle of a pandemic, with so many people suffering alone, it seemed an appropriate time to hear from a Delta blues singer. Enter Watermelon Slim.

May 14, 2020

Episode 3: The Hospital

The doctors and nurses at Greenwood Leflore Hospital braced for the pandemic, sectioning off their ICU and preparing for an influx of patients. Then the virus struck one of their own.

May 6, 2020

Episode 2: Parchman

How do you self-isolate when your home is a single room that you share with 107 men? That's what inmates at Mississippi's infamous Parchman prison have been wondering for six weeks. They've watched the number of coronavirus cases tick up in the counties around them, and with it, their fear.

May 4, 2020

How the EPA has left Americans exposed to lead in drinking water

Millions of people still get water through lead pipes. For decades, lax EPA rules missed hazardous lead levels and allowed some utilities to remain indifferent. Today the Trump administration is rushing to finalize a plan that might make things worse.

April 30, 2020

Episode 1: Greenville

In early April, a storm hit Greenville, Mississippi. It started when two pastors and the mayor clashed over how to do church during a pandemic. Then Fox News got involved. This is the first episode of a six-part special report on coronavirus in the Mississippi Delta.

April 27, 2020

Public health labs suffered budget cuts prior to coronavirus

An APM Reports analysis finds that public labs in at least 10 states -- the first line of defense in an outbreak -- endured budget troubles or staffing shortages in the past decade. The labs will be critical to conducting the increased testing needed to end social distancing.

March 26, 2020

Eleven states don't track or reveal Covid-19 hospitalizations

State health officials in Washington and California are scrambling to create mechanisms for hospitals to report their Covid-19 patients in real time.

October 15, 2019

The invention of a disease and the pursuit of one molecule

In the 1970s, the founder of the National Institute on Aging convinced a nation that senility was really Alzheimer's and could be cured. Research money flowed to one theory, leaving alternatives unexamined — today it's come up short.

October 15, 2019

Alzheimer's research: The setup and setbacks

A select timeline of research, discovery, salesmanship and spending. Said Zaven Khachaturian, a former director of Alzheimer's research at the National Institute on Aging: 'Every major pharmaceutical company put money into the amyloid idea, and they all failed because the idea was flawed ... It became gradually an infallible belief system ... that's not very healthy for science when scientists ... accept an idea as infallible. That's when you run into problems.'

September 17, 2019

As concerns rise over youth vaping, Juul quickly puts together an army of lobbyists

With state and federal governments looking to restrict vaping, the nation's largest e-cigarette maker pushed back with a multimillion-dollar advocacy campaign.

February 7, 2019

In cities on the Great Lakes, water pipes are crumbling and poor people are paying the price

Americans are struggling to afford their rising water bills, and thousands of poor families have had their service shut off. This growing crisis has a dark irony: It's especially acute in a region where water is most abundant — the Great Lakes.

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