Selena Simmons-Duffin
Selena Simmons-Duffin reports on health policy for NPR.
She has worked at NPR for ten years as a show editor and producer, with one stopover at WAMU in 2017 as part of a staff exchange. For four months, she reported local Washington, DC, health stories, including a secretive maternity ward closure and a gesundheit machine.
Before coming to All Things Considered in 2016, Simmons-Duffin spent six years on Morning Edition working shifts at all hours and directing the show. She also drove the full length of the U.S.-Mexico border in 2014 for the "Borderland" series.
She won a Gracie Award in 2015 for creating a video called "Talking While Female," and a 2014 AAAS Kavli Science Journalism Award for producing a series on why you should love your microbes.
Simmons-Duffin attended Stanford University, where she majored in English. She took time off from college to do HIV/AIDS-related work in East Africa. She started out in radio at Stanford's radio station, KZSU, and went on to study documentary radio at the Salt Institute, before coming to NPR as an intern in 2009.
She lives in Washington, DC, with her spouse and kids.
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A new study shows women who call the hospitals in Oklahoma get confusing information about the state's abortion bans. One family lived through that confusion with dire consequences last month. -
In a state that bans abortion, anxiety about rape and getting pregnant drove this teen to start on birth control, though she's not having sex.
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The Supreme Court will weigh in on whether doctors can still provide patients with mifepristone across the country. Abortion providers share how they're navigating this uncertainty with patients.
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The start of pregnancy — as well as exactly when that happens — is a hot topic in some state legislatures and U.S. courts. Understanding the nuances of what happens when has never been more important. -
A national poll finds that a majority of Americans have felt the effects of gun violence in their personal lives.
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When she gave birth to her baby with a fatal condition two months early, Samantha Casiano scrambled to raise funds for the funeral. Anti-abortion advocates say Texas laws are "working as designed."
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When she gave birth to her baby with a fatal condition two months early, Samantha Casiano scrambled to raise funds for the funeral. Anti-abortion advocates say Texas laws are "working as designed." -
A decade after a landmark report on Americans' shorter lives, the problem has only gotten worse. Unlike other wealthy nations, U.S. life expectancy has not bounced back from the pandemic.
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After years of high rates, the country hit a new high during the pandemic, far exceeding rates in other developed nations. Black women are at especially high risk. -
California's governor tweeted out the state was "done" with Walgreens because of its response to a threat from 20 Republican attorneys general over abortion pills.
