Community & Public Health

While the government banned lead-based paint in 1978, more than 75 percent of houses in Chicago were built before 1970, affecting children with lead poisoning.

Drinking water have been contaminated with lead. Chicago residents and property owners are expected to deal with the problem. Experts are pressing the city to make some changes and take action.

This article was produced as a project for the USC Center for Health Journalism’s California Fellowship.

Brain researchers have found a surprising commonality in how genes are expressed in the brain: There are just 32 different patterns. The finding opens up new horizons for treatments.

“Who has seen a behavioral counselor?” Roughly half of the kids at the Yurok Tribe's youth wellness event stepped forward. “Who has suffered from depression or anxiety?” Three-quarters of the kids came forward.

When it comes to addressing disorders of the brain, the medical toolkit is weak. But new mapping projects underway could gradually change our ability to treat many common brain disorders.

New models in Britain and the U.S. take a larger view of the forces that shape people’s health. That’s because sometimes a patient needs an air conditioner more than a hospital bed.

When an anonymous source informed The Detroit News that the Detroit Medical Center was improperly sterilizing surgical equipment, health care reporter Karen Bouffard started digging.

The U.S. has moved decisively toward fluoridation in water, which shows that it’s possible to move out of an area of doubt and confusion and into an era where good science is accepted and basic public health measures are taken.

A data-driven look at opioid addiction in San Diego found that old assumptions about addiction hotspots were outdated. Reporter Leo Castaneda shares this and other field lessons he learned along the way.