Community & Public Health

Disturbed by stories about the rape and beatings of teens by supervisory staff and fellow detainees, Miami-Dade’s state attorney is asking a grand jury to investigate the Florida juvenile justice system.

"The community engagement process pushed me out of my reporting comfort zone, and not only led to new sources but strengthened the relationships I had with previous sources," writes Fresno Bee reporter Mackenzie Mays.

The closure was a big blow for Warren County, an area of the state considered a primary care desert, where doctors are few and patients are often forced to go without health care.

Community clinics in Los Angeles know they have to find new ways to get at the social factors that ultimately shape health if they're going to make a real difference in their patients' lives.

Earlier this week, Harvard researchers released a study that makes a downright gloomy prediction: Nearly six in 10 of today’s children will be obese by age 35, if current trends continue.

Two patient advocates make a case for why patients need a stronger bill of rights to ensure they receive quality care and are more involved in care decisions.

On a Monday in early October, the top administrator at the the Manatee Regional Juvenile Detention Center in Bradenton, Florida issued a terse order to subordinates: “Do not flush.”

Half of California’s 10 counties with the highest teenage birth rates are in the Central Valley, despite statewide record lows in teen births. Even so, the Valley lacks programs that help boys understand the responsibilities of sex and parenthood.

While the drug’s $94,500 cost puts it out of reach of the uninsured patients who use the Florida clinic, the drug’s maker provides it for free to qualified, low-income patients.

The numbers are eye-popping: $25,000 MRIs, the $1,000-a-day hepatitis B drug, $629 for an ER visit that only delivered a Band-Aid. As leading health care economists bluntly put it in a famous research paper, “It’s the prices stupid.” Experts increasingly point to the high cost of care in America — n