Pien Huang
Pien Huang is a health reporter on the Science desk. She was NPR's first Reflect America Fellow, working with shows, desks and podcasts to bring more diverse voices to air and online.
She's a former producer for WBUR/NPR's On Point and was a 2018 Environmental Reporting Fellow with The GroundTruth Project at WCAI in Cape Cod, covering the human impact on climate change. As a freelance audio and digital reporter, Huang's stories on the environment, arts and culture have been featured on NPR, the BBC and PRI's The World.
Huang's experiences span categories and continents. She was executive producer of Data Made to Matter, a podcast from the MIT Sloan School of Management, and was also an adjunct instructor in podcasting and audio journalism at Northeastern University. She worked as a project manager for public artist Ralph Helmick to help plan and execute The Founder's Memorial in Abu Dhabi and with Stoltze Design to tell visual stories through graphic design. Huang has traveled with scientists looking for signs of environmental change in Cameroon's frogs, in Panama's plants and in the ocean water off the ice edge of Antarctica. She has a degree in environmental science and public policy from Harvard.
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Pfizer has submitted data on its bivalent COVID-19 booster shot that specifically targets the latest omicron subvariants. If authorized, the company says the shots could be ready as soon as September. -
Missteps and delays have hampered the U.S. effort to vaccinate people against monkeypox. Now state health officials and community members are trying to adapt to a controversial "dose sparing" plan. -
The U.S. is facing a shortage of the monkeypox vaccine as the outbreak grows rapidly. The White House is pursuing a controversial strategy where each person only gets a fraction of the full dose.
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The CDC stopped recommending quarantines or test-to-stay in schools. It's part of a relaxation of COVID guidance that acknowledges the virus is here to stay, and that many people have prior immunity.
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Revised guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention looks to minimize COVID-19's disruption of daily life while conceding that the pandemic isn't over. -
The Biden administration is allowing the shot to be given between layers of skin — a method that only requires a fifth of the full dose — in order to increase vaccinations and slow the outbreak. -
Is it a sexually transmitted disease? Can you get it on a crowded bus? Trying on clothes? We talk to specialists about how this virus is transmitted and what kinds of precautions are warranted. -
The White House has declared monkeypox to be a public health emergency. This could be a turning point in the lackluster monkeypox response.
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Though doctors and advocates have helped speed up access to the antiviral pills – of which the U.S. has enough to treat 1.7 million people – health providers are few and forms are still required. -
There's increasing concern that the window of opportunity to contain the monkeypox outbreak in the U.S. has closed. Some experts say it's already too late.
