I cover a range of subjects, including reproductive health, long Covid, brain science, neurological disorders, mental health and genetics. My stories aim to depict the reality of people’s experiences with health and medicine, reflecting its complexity, subtlety, unpredictability and individuality. I’m interested in how developments and challenges in illness and medical science affect patients, families and communities. I’ve written about postpartum depression and infectious diseases like Covid-19, Ebola and Zika. I also cover the intersection of policy and health, such as abortion and contraception. And I’ve done investigative reporting on controversial issues, such as the Alzheimer’s drug Aduhelm. I also enjoy writing about lighter topics, including a cat that got lost near the Daytona Speedway but somehow navigated 200 miles home two months later and the discovery of the world’s oldest leather shoe (size 7, right foot, preserved for 5,500 years in sheep dung).
My Background
I’ve reported throughout the United States and in Asia, South America, Europe and Africa. After graduating from Princeton with a degree in international relations, I became a freelance foreign correspondent in the Philippines, primarily for The San Francisco Chronicle, then worked in Atlanta and Philadelphia.
At The Times, I served as bureau chief in the Midwest and New England, then received a yearlong fellowship to study science at M.I.T. and Harvard and began covering medical subjects.
I’m honored that my work on Ebola with six colleagues won a Pulitzer Prize for international reporting and other awards. I contributed, with many colleagues, to coverage of Covid-19, which earned The Times a Pulitzer for public service. Other honors include the Victor Cohn Prize for Excellence in Medical Science Reporting and being selected for The Best American Science Writing. My book “Island Practice,” about an unusual doctor, has been optioned for television. I’m also a jazz flutist and once sang a Sinatra song to get a story.
Journalistic Ethics
My colleagues at The Times and I are committed to upholding the standards of integrity outlined in our Ethical Journalism Handbook. I work hard to ensure that my stories are accurate and fair. It’s very important to me to treat people with respect and empathy. I explain the story I am working on and encourage people to feel comfortable asking me questions about the process. I honor commitments I make to sources. I ask for evidence and documentation, and I believe that journalism should hold institutions and powerful figures to account for their actions. I do not accept gifts, money or favors from those who are involved in a story I’m working on. I do not participate in political causes or make political donations. I make every effort to understand issues from multiple angles and perspectives.
It was much more accurate than primary care doctors using cognitive tests and CT scans. The findings could speed the quest for an affordable and accessible way to diagnose patients with memory problems.
The drug, Kisunla, made by Eli Lilly, is the latest in a new class of treatments that could modestly slow cognitive decline in initial stages of the disease but also carry safety risks.
People with two copies of the gene variant APOE4 are almost certain to get Alzheimer’s, say researchers, who proposed a framework under which such patients could be diagnosed years before symptoms.
The Biden administration is arguing that Idaho’s near-total abortion ban violates a federal law on emergency treatment.
By Sabrina Tavernise, Pam Belluck, Abbie VanSickle, Stella Tan, Alex Stern, Jessica Cheung, M.J. Davis Lin, Dan Powell, Marion Lozano, Elisheba Ittoop and Chris Wood
The court’s ruling could extend to at least half a dozen other states that have similarly restrictive bans, and the implications of the case could stretch beyond abortion.
The federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, known as EMTALA, requires hospitals to provide medically necessary care to stabilize patients in emergency situations.
Some states with Republican-controlled legislatures want more data, while some controlled by Democrats want less, fearing it could be used to target patients or providers.
Several justices questioned the remedy of applying nationwide restrictions to mifepristone because it would be the first time a court had second-guessed the F.D.A.’s expert judgment on a drug.
Eli Lilly’s donanemab was expected to be approved this month, but the agency has decided to convene a panel of independent experts to evaluate the drug’s safety and efficacy.
People with long Covid symptoms scored slightly lower on a cognitive test than people who had recovered. But long Covid patients who eventually got better scored as well as those whose symptoms did not last long.
N.I.H. researchers found notable differences between the immune systems and other physiological functions of patients with ME/CFS and those of healthy patients.
The journal found that the studies, which had suggested that medication abortion is unsafe, included incorrect factual assumptions and misleading presentation of the data.
The federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, known as EMTALA, requires hospitals to provide medically necessary care to stabilize patients in emergency situations.
The restrictions, which would prevent mifepristone from being mailed to patients and would require in-person doctor visits, are on hold until the Supreme Court weighs in.
Because the pill works faster than other antidepressants and is taken for only two weeks, it may encourage more treatment of the debilitating condition.
A trial of donanemab, an experimental drug, found it modestly slowed the worsening of memory and thinking and worked better in patients at earlier stages and those under 75.
Medicare will cover much of the cost for patients in the early stages of the disease, but Leqembi has safety risks and can only modestly slow cognitive decline.
In lawsuits challenging state abortion bans, lawyers for abortion rights plaintiffs are employing religious liberty arguments the Christian right has used for decades.
The panel will vote Wednesday on whether the risks outweigh the benefits. The company says the tablet, Opill, is safe and easy to use but F.D.A. scientists have concerns about the data.
The justices are poised to consider whether the most common method of ending pregnancies can be sharply curtailed in states where abortion remains legal.
A federal appeals court has upheld part of a Texas judge’s decision. The Justice Department says it will ask the Supreme Court to weigh in. Here is what’s at stake.
The preliminary ruling from Judge Matthew J. Kacsmaryk adopts the terminology of anti-abortion groups, such as “chemical abortion,” “abortionist” and “unborn human.”
More than 400 executives said that the decision ignored both scientific and legal precedent and that, if the ruling stood, it would create uncertainty for the pharmaceutical and biotech industries.
Legal scholars say the ruling by a Texas judge, if upheld, could spur disputes over many medications and upend the drug industry’s reliance on the agency.
One federal judge said the F.D.A.’s approval of the drug mifepristone was invalid, while another federal judge ordered the agency to keep the pill available. The legal fallout is just beginning.
One invalidated the F.D.A.’s approval of the abortion pill mifepristone. The other ordered the F.D.A. to do nothing to restrict the pill’s availability.
Wyoming’s Constitution guarantees a right to make individual health care decisions. The new ban attempts to circumvent that right by declaring that abortion is not health care.
The law is the only one in the nation to prohibit the use separate from an overall abortion ban and is part of a growing effort by conservative states to target the pills.
The judge said he would decide soon whether to issue a preliminary injunction ordering the F.D.A. to withdraw its approval of the drug or wait for the full trial.
Saying he wanted safe and orderly proceedings, Judge Matthew J. Kacsmaryk asked lawyers not to disclose the hearing and planned to add it to the public case file only the evening before.
The study, which examined patients infected early in the pandemic, found they were significantly more likely than people who didn’t get Covid to experience lingering reflux, constipation and other issues.
The decision applies to conservative states whose attorneys general threatened Walgreens and other pharmacies with legal action if they dispensed the pill there.
A lawsuit could force the F.D.A. to revoke its approval of the two main drugs used for medication abortion in the United States.
By Michael Barbaro, Sabrina Tavernise, Alex Stern, Mary Wilson, Clare Toeniskoetter, Diana Nguyen, Paige Cowett, John Ketchum, Dan Powell, Marion Lozano and Chris Wood
The results of an innovative study suggest electrical stimulation of the spinal cord could eventually help some of the many people disabled by strokes.
The case, brought by GenBioPro, a company that makes one of two abortion drugs, argues that it is unconstitutional for a state to bar access to a medication approved by the federal government.
An analysis of workers’ compensation claims in New York found that 71 percent of claimants with long Covid needed continuing medical treatment or were unable to work for six months or more.