NPR has a small investigative reporting unit. Here's how they decide when to dig in

With recent congressional scrutiny on NPR and the broader public media system, many people are asking how and why NPR news stories come to be. The NPR investigative reporting unit is a small group of journalists, and their stories often take a long time to report. The work is unique. It's rare that another newsroom will report on the same issues. I spoke to NPR"s Public Editor about my work for the team.

Diseases are spreading. The CDC isn't warning the public like it was months ago

To accomplish its mission of increasing the health security of the U.S., the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention states that it "conducts critical science and provides health information" to protect the nation. But since President Trump's administration assumed power in January, many of the platforms the CDC used to communicate with the public have gone silent, my investigation for NPR found.

In the middle of a hepatitis outbreak, U.S. shutters the one CDC lab that could help

The kind of genetic tracing that the CDC's lab performs is not conducted by any other lab in the United States or the world, experts interviewed by NPR said. While the lab remains shuttered, ongoing investigations of current hepatitis outbreaks have been stalled, not just in Florida, but also in Oregon, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, New Mexico, Wisconsin, West Virginia and Georgia, according to CDC employees who work closely with the Division of Viral Hepatitis. The five CDC employees NPR spoke with requested that their names not be shared for fear of retaliation.

Unmarked cars and secret orders: How a pharmacy prepared drugs for Texas’ executions

The state of Texas, blocked from purchasing lethal injection drugs by major pharmaceutical companies that refuse to participate in executions, bought them instead from an in-state compounding pharmacy with a history of more than a dozen safety and cleanliness violations, NPR has learned. Rite-Away Pharmacy and Medical Supply in suburban San Antonio produced injectable pentobarbital from 2019 through at least late 2023 for Texas to use in executions, records from the state Department of Crimin...

Concrete structures meant to protect Baltimore bridge appear unchanged for decades

Seconds before the container ship Dali hit the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore last week and tore it down, killing six construction workers, it sailed past a structure designed to prevent that kind of disaster.

Although Maryland has invested in repairing the Key Bridge, records reviewed by NPR indicate the dolphins have not been substantially changed since they were built in the 1970s.

'We got workers in the water': Audio reveals new details of Baltimore bridge rescue

NPR's Investigations Team analyzed more than 1,000 radio messages exchanged between first responders from the Maryland Transportation Authority Police, Baltimore City Fire Department and Baltimore City Police on the day of the collapse, downloaded from Broadcastify.com. The communications, most of which have not been published by any other outlet, reveal new details about the response from police and firefighters and highlight what those first responders did and did not know about the construction crew before and after the collapse.
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