Richard Knox

Credit Jacques Coughlin

Since he joined NPR in 2000, Knox has covered a broad range of issues and events in public health, medicine, and science. His reports can be heard on NPR's Morning Edition, All Things Considered, Weekend Edition, Talk of the Nation, and newscasts.

Among other things, Knox's NPR reports have examined the impact of HIV/AIDS in Africa, North America, and the Caribbean; anthrax terrorism; smallpox and other bioterrorism preparedness issues; the rising cost of medical care; early detection of lung cancer; community caregiving; music and the brain; and the SARS epidemic.

Before joining NPR, Knox covered medicine and health for The Boston Globe. His award-winning 1995 articles on medical errors are considered landmarks in the national movement to prevent medical mistakes. Knox is a graduate of the University of Illinois and Columbia University. He has held yearlong fellowships at Stanford and Harvard Universities, and is the author of a 1993 book on Germany's health care system.

He and his wife Jean, an editor, live in Boston. They have two daughters.

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12:01am

Tue July 19, 2011
Shots - Health Blog

HIV Treatment In Africa Brings Near-Normal Lifespan

Credit Adek Berry / AFP/Getty Images

Lately the good news about HIV/AIDS just keeps rolling in.

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1:41pm

Fri July 15, 2011
Shots - Health Blog

As Cholera Surges In Haiti, Aid Withers Away

Credit Cate Osborn / Partners in Health

Cholera is back in Haiti.

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11:17am

Thu July 14, 2011
Shots - Health Blog

Who Should Get Pills To Prevent HIV?

Credit Justin Sullivan / Getty Images

AIDS researchers are excited — to use their word — about two new studies that seem to nail down the effectiveness of a daily antiviral pill to protecting heterosexual men and women against HIV.

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4:46pm

Tue July 12, 2011
Shots - Health Blog

Super-Resistant Gonorrhea Strain Found In Japan

Credit CDC

The emergence of a strain of gonorrhea that can thwart the last antibiotic effective in treating the common sexually transmitted disease was bound to happen, experts say.

The new, super-resistant strain is called H041, and so far, only a handful of cases are known in Japan. But don't count on it staying that way. Experience has shown that once a resistant strain of gonorrhea appears, it steadily displaces those that can be killed with antibiotics.

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5:26pm

Fri July 8, 2011
Science And Medicine

A Prenatal Surgery For Spina Bifida Comes Of Age

When she was 19 weeks pregnant, Sarah White went for a routine ultrasound and got a shock.

"I could tell that something was wrong because the ultrasound tech got real quiet," White says.

White's male fetus had spina bifida — a hole in his lower back that exposed the vulnerable spinal cord.

"When they said, 'Your baby has spina bifida,' I knew it wasn't good," says Joe Hensley, White's husband. "But I didn't have a sense of what was involved."

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