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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It was a chaotic week for the nation's health agencies, as layoff notices rolled in along with an order for deep cuts to contract spending. NPR's health reporters tell us what they've learned.
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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.
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Senators grilled Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on vaccines, abortion and Medicaid in his confirmation hearing to lead HHS. RFK Jr. has another hearing Thursday. -
In a memo obtained by NPR, acting Health Secretary Dorothy Fink forbade staff from public communications on most matters until Feb. 1, unless they get express approval from "a presidential appointee." -
About 24 million people have signed up for Affordable Care Act plans with about a week to go in open enrollment. But President-elect Trump has talked about possibly repealing the 14-year-old ACA.
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A new analysis of private insurance claims data finds less than 0.1% of youth accessed puberty blockers or hormones for gender transition. This small group has garnered a huge amount of attention from Republican lawmakers in recent years. -
Dr. Rachel Levine is the highest ranking, out transgender person ever to serve in the federal government. Her tenure at HHS ran concurrent with an explosion in state legislation targeting transgender people. -
The man charged in the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was critical of U.S. health care. Experts say the system's problems are complex and can't be pinned on one player or industry. -
NPR staff recommend 5 non-fiction books for reading over the holidays or anytime, really: "The New India," "Unshrinking," "We're Alone," "New Cold Wars," and "Between Two Sounds."
