This story is the first in a series exploring the deaths of homeless people in Santa Clara County — who the victims were, how they died and what might be done to save the lives of people few may remember.
This project received support from the Center for Health Journalism's California Fellowship and its Fund for Journalism on Child Well-being.
Other stories in the series include:
Black babies die at twice the rate of white babies. My family is part of this statistic
America's black babies are pay
Mike Hixenbaugh shares how he and Charlie Ornstein exposed the unusually high rate of deaths and complications at one of the country’s best known heart transplant programs.
It's one thing to identify the complex social cause of this crisis. It's far harder to combat racism and stop more babies from dying.
New research finds that among very preterm babies, where they are born matters greatly. And black and Hispanic mothers are more likely to deliver at hospitals with worse outcomes.
Black women have twice the risk of developing breast cancer as white women, and three times the mortality rate. They also have far less access to screening.
In California, fines up to $125,000 per preventable mistake have not made a significant dent in the number of medical errors. Despite recent gains, the number is still higher than when the state’s program began nine years ago.
