Jason Beaubien
Jason Beaubien is NPR's Global Health and Development Correspondent on the Science Desk.
In this role, he reports on a range of issues across the world. He's covered the plight of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh, mass cataract surgeries in Ethiopia, abortion in El Salvador, poisonous gold mines in Nigeria, drug-resistant malaria in Myanmar and tuberculosis in Tajikistan. He was part of a team of reporters at NPR that won a Peabody Award in 2015 for their extensive coverage of the West Africa Ebola outbreak. His current beat also examines development issues including why Niger has the highest birth rate in the world, can private schools serve some of the poorest kids on the planet and the links between obesity and economic growth.
Prior to becoming the Global Health and Development Correspondent in 2012, Beaubien spent four years based in Mexico City covering Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean. In that role, Beaubien filed stories on politics in Cuba, the 2010 Haitian earthquake, the FMLN victory in El Salvador, the world's richest man and Mexico's brutal drug war.
For his first multi-part series as the Mexico City correspondent, Beaubien drove the length of the U.S./Mexico border making a point to touch his toes in both oceans. The stories chronicled the economic, social and political changes along the violent frontier.
In 2002, Beaubien joined NPR after volunteering to cover a coup attempt in the Ivory Coast. Over the next four years, Beaubien worked as a foreign correspondent in sub-Saharan Africa, visiting 27 countries on the continent. His reporting ranged from poverty on the world's poorest continent, the HIV in the epicenter of the epidemic, and the all-night a cappella contests in South Africa, to Afro-pop stars in Nigeria and a trial of white mercenaries in Equatorial Guinea.
During this time, he covered the famines and wars of Africa, as well as inspiring preachers and Nobel laureates. Beaubien was one of the first journalists to report on the huge exodus of people out of Sudan's Darfur region into Chad, as villagers fled some of the initial attacks by the Janjawid. He reported extensively on the steady deterioration of Zimbabwe and still has a collection of worthless Zimbabwean currency.
In 2006, Beaubien was awarded a Knight-Wallace fellowship at the University of Michigan to study the relationship between the developed and the developing world.
Beaubien grew up in Maine, started his radio career as an intern at NPR Member Station KQED in San Francisco and worked at WBUR in Boston before joining NPR.
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Experts consider the effect of humidity on the virus and the method of transmission as they keep an eye on where the disease spikes next. -
Researchers are looking at how the country emerges from one of the largest lockdowns in human history — and whether the drop-off in new cases continues.
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This veteran of fighting HIV/AIDS around the world knows a thing or two about stopping epidemics. But are some of her assumptions too rosy? -
It's one of several places in Asia that did not use draconian lockdown strategies to slow the spread of the coronavirus.
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Countries are doing everything from closing schools to banning weddings. But there is concern about the toll on fragile health-care systems, livelihoods and people with HIV, TB and malaria. -
The White House announced nearly 2 million coronavirus tests will be made available starting this week. It is estimated that labs across the country will be able to test up to 4,000 people a day.
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Around the world, different countries have responded differently to the coronavirus crisis — with dramatically different results.
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Last week's testimony before Gambia's Truth Commission riveted the country and described a culture of systematic sexual abuse in the presidential palace. -
Hong Kong has avoided large-scale outbreaks. But that containment has come at a significant cost to the city. -
Hong Kong is dealing with hundreds of suspected cases. Nurses say they'll walk out on Monday if the city doesn't seal its border with China.
