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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The state and local health departments that rely on CDC funding say the money is not coming in on time and no one can tell them why. Some are laying off staff. -
In recent years, health insurers ramped up the practice of requiring doctors to get their approval before tests and procedures. On Monday, health leaders announced voluntary reforms from insurers. -
The 988 Suicide and Crisis Prevention Lifeline included a service that provided specialized suicide prevention support by phone and text for LGBTQ+ kids. That's ending. -
Americans across the political spectrum like Medicaid and think it should get more funding, not less, according to a new poll from health research organization KFF. -
American life expectancy in 1960 was almost ten years shorter than it is today. And the leading causes of death were chronic diseases. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. frequently tells a different story. -
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is standing firm on the sweeping cuts to the Department of Health and Human Services, cuts he says were suggested by Elon Musk and his DOGE team. -
On Wednesday, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. goes to Capitol Hill to promote and defend his massive overhaul of HHS, and President Trump's plans to change it even more. -
Trump's Justice Department asked for a lawsuit against the abortion medication mifepristone to be dismissed. It's a surprising move, given that it is similar to one the Biden administration made.
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The Trump administration began firing thousands of employees at the Department of Health and Human Services on Tuesday as part of a plan announced by HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
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The Trump administration Thursday announced a major restructuring of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services that will cut 20,000 full-time jobs — or 25% of its staff.
