Rob Stein
Rob Stein is a correspondent and senior editor on NPR's science desk.
An award-winning science journalist with more than 30 years of experience, Stein mostly covers health and medicine. He tends to focus on stories that illustrate the intersection of science, health, politics, social trends, ethics, and federal science policy. He tracks genetics, stem cells, cancer research, women's health issues, and other science, medical, and health policy news.
Before NPR, Stein worked at The Washington Post for 16 years, first as the newspaper's science editor and then as a national health reporter. Earlier in his career, Stein spent about four years as an editor at NPR's science desk. Before that, he was a science reporter for United Press International (UPI) in Boston and the science editor of the international wire service in Washington.
Stein's work has been honored by many organizations, including the National Academy of Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Association for Cancer Research, and the Association of Health Care Journalists. He was twice part of NPR teams that won Peabody Awards.
Stein frequently represents NPR, speaking at universities, international meetings and other venues, including the University of Cambridge in Britain, the World Conference of Science Journalists in South Korea, and the Aspen Institute in Washington, DC.
Stein is a graduate of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. He completed a journalism fellowship at the Harvard School of Public Health, a program in science and religion at the University of Cambridge, and a summer science writer's workshop at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Mass.
-
A panel of doctors and scientists advising the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention voted to recommend that people 6 months of age and older get new COVID boosters this fall. -
Using CRISPR to modify certain immune cells could make cancer-fighting immunotherapy more potent for a broader set of patients. After undergoing a new form of experimental therapy, Parkville resident Katie Pope Kopp is now in remission. -
Johnson & Johnson said that when it gave study participants a second jab after six months, their antibody levels were nine times higher than they were 28 days after a first dose of the COVID vaccine. -
The CDC information dated Thursday gives new details on this variant of the coronavirus and says the agency should "acknowledge that the war has changed." It was first reported by The Washington Post. -
The CDC just released new estimates showing the highly contagious delta variant now accounts for 51.7% of cases in the U.S. In Missouri, Kansas and other hotspots, the strain is responsible for 80% of cases. -
We're in shutdown mode for now, but what comes next? Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is working on a plan to safely reopen the country. -
Scientists have been able to keep human embryos alive twice as long as before. The technique is reopening a debate over a rule limiting research on human embryos to 14 days. -
The federal agency will start producing a weekly update based on testing and reports from doctors and hospitals around the country of people being getting pneumonia and diagnosed with COVID-19.
-
One big commercial testing lab revealed a backlog of at least 115,000 tests, illustrating the scope of the coronavirus testing problems. -
One of the nation's biggest medical testing companies acknowledged a backlog of at least 115,000 coronavirus tests, illustrating how the nation is struggling to test effectively during the pandemic.
