In areas overwhelmed by COVID cases, hospitals must rely on traveling nurses to operate ICUs. Hospitals pay a premium for that temporary help, while also struggling to keep their staff nurses happy.
Fatal drug overdoses, including from meth, have soared. California is preparing to roll out a controversial but proven treatment that involves paying stimulant users small sums of money not to use.
More than 2 million Americans are uninsured because they live in the 12 states that didn't expand Medicaid. 60% are people of color. Will Congress help by including them in the new spending bill?
Many K-12 school districts are tapping federal funds to pay for regular surveillance testing of students. It's an effective pandemic tactic when used alongside mask-wearing and other precautions.
Scientists are still studying whether the deworming medicine could have any effect on COVID-19. But the frenzy over the drug has far more to do with politics than science. Here's how that happened.
Patients with advanced cancer and heart disease are among those who have had to wait for surgeries and other procedures as critically ill, unvaccinated COVID patients strain the medical system.
Simone Gold isn't alone. NPR found other physicians who retained their licenses despite spreading misinformation online and to the media about effective COVID-19 vaccines and unproven treatments.
Democratic lawmakers are pressing the e-commerce giant about what it's doing to stop its systems from recommending books and other products with falsehoods about the pandemic and vaccines.
After their brother died, two sisters faced a barrage of misinformation, pandemic denialism and blaming questions. Grief experts say that makes COVID-19 the newest kind of "disenfranchising death."
Portland has helped boost Oregon's overall vaccination rate, but rural areas lag far behind. That's allowed the pandemic to rage in places such as the Rogue Valley, where hospitals are overwhelmed.
The versatile and impassioned singer was ready to throw in the towel until she heard a message in a Nina Simone song that told her, "You're going be fine. I understand how you feel. Keep going."
How a sexual assault survivor is questioned by police can greatly influence the ability to access memories of that traumatic incident. Better interview techniques might help solve more cases.
Voting officials, who used to operate in relative anonymity, are facing threats and intense pressure as a large chunk of American voters have no confidence the system is fair.