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As teens, these three women lived amid street gangs around East St Louis, Illinois. Now, as adults, they support the families who have lost loved ones to gun violence. And because of their past, some residents trust them more than they do the police.
In a city plagued by gun violence, Mykael Ash is turning ammunition into art. Ash, who lives in East St. Louis, Illinois, frequently walks through parts of the city where bullet shells aren鈥檛 hard to find. The shell casings represent a cycle of inequality, Ash says, and the art he makes with it serves as a call to action.
Physicians have long believed it鈥檚 good medicine to consider race in health care. But recently, rather than perpetuate the myth that race governs how bodies function, a more nuanced approach has emerged: acknowledging that racial health disparities often reflect the effects of generations of systemic racism, such as lack of access to stable housing or nutritious food.
Mourners are wrapping caskets in imagery, similar to the way companies wrap logos around cars, trucks, and buses. Across the country, casket-wrap companies create custom designs, too often for grieving parents who have lost their children to gun violence.
Just as Uber Eats and Grubhub revolutionized food delivery, Black tech entrepreneurs want to change the way patients connect with doctors. They are using technology to match people of color with culturally competent professionals and the transportation they need to get to them.
In communities across the country, the Cooperative Extension System, the same organization that supports 4-H clubs nationally, is tapping its roots in rural communities to promote vaccines. But its approach to getting people vaccinated in many communities, including Cairo, Illinois, must be nuanced.
U.S. Rep. Sharice Davids (D-Kansas) introduced a bill to do away with a health insurance rule that dictates which parent鈥檚 plan becomes a new baby鈥檚 primary insurer. This could save some parents from unexpected, sometimes massive medical bills. Davids took up the issue after a KHN/NPR Bill of the Month story on one family鈥檚 unexpected $207,455 NICU bill.
When estimating how well a patient鈥檚 kidneys are working, doctors frequently turn to an equation that depends on a question: Is the patient Black? Kidney experts are now debating how to remove the race adjustment and whether the question is a function of sound science. It鈥檚 considered just the first step in dismantling institutional racism in kidney care.
Arthur and Maggie Kelley of St. Louis died 30 days apart. Maggie died of complications of dementia in November. Arthur, who had moved into her nursing home to be with her, died a month later of covid. Their family held a double funeral.
Charlie Kjelshus needed neonatal intensive care for the first seven days of her life. The episode generated huge bills, and left her parents in a tangle of red tape that involved two insurers, two hospitals and two states.
How do we as Black people protect ourselves from racism? In our household, my decision to let my hair go natural forced my father and me to have a conversation about personal safety, the police and my desire to feel free. He viewed my permed hair and weave as a protective shield that increased my chances of making it home safely. But, in reality, my haircut 鈥 long or short 鈥 can鈥檛 protect me from racism.
鈥淟ost on the Frontline鈥 is an ongoing project by Kaiser Health News and The Guardian that aims to document the lives of health care workers in the U.S. who died from COVID 19, and to investigate why so many are victims of the disease.
Around the country, Medicaid enrollment is up as people who have lost jobs during the pandemic seek health insurance. Expanding eligibility for Missouri鈥檚 program, which could help thousands of recently unemployed residents, will be on the ballot Tuesday.
Darnell Hill, a mental health caseworker, is teaching black teens in St. Louis how to safely walk through the park, run to the store or handle an encounter with the police. Beyond tangible skills, he offers comfort and a semblance of control to those for whom birding, running or walking down the street hold the risk of racial violence.
Check out the revamped video series from KHN 鈥 Behind The Byline: How The Story Got Made. Come along as journalists and producers offer an insider鈥檚 view of health care coverage that does not quit.
The overall crime rate has dropped during the pandemic, but unfortunately gun violence has not. In St. Louis, at least 11 children have been killed by gunfire so far this year. Living in neighborhoods with frequent violence has forced some families to improvise ways to keep their children safe, even in the place they are supposed to be most secure: their home. The stress of growing up in these conditions could lead to chronic health problems into adulthood.
Twins Edna Mayes and Ethel Sylvester, 92, are relying on each other through the pandemic, in which one of the hidden dangers is to their mental health.
About 1 in 5 U.S. residents live in multigenerational households. Many of those have three or more generations all under one roof. While the living arrangement has financial and emotional benefits, those families face a unique set of challenges as COVID-19 continues to spread.
Under pressure, the federal government announced it will let surgery centers, hotels and even college dorms serve as hospitals to treat an overflow of patients.
A coalition of anesthesiologists wants to repurpose the country's more than 5,000 surgery centers to serve as emergency overflow amid the coronavirus pandemic. The centers have trained medical staff largely sitting idle, anesthesia machines that could be turned into ventilators, and empty medical space. But obstacles such as federal payment rules, logistics and some skepticism are getting in the way.
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