Sarah Fentem
ReporterSarah Fentem reports on sickness and health as part of St. Louis Public Radio’s news team. She previously spent five years reporting for different NPR stations in Indiana, immersing herself deep, deep into an insurance policy beat from which she may never fully recover. A longitme NPR listener, she grew up hearing WQUB in Quincy, Illinois, which is now owned by STLPR. She lives in the Kingshighway Hills neighborhood, and in her spare time likes to watch old sitcoms, meticulously clean and organize her home and go on outdoor adventures with her fiancé Elliot. She has a cat, Lil Rock, and a dog, Ginger.
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Missouri is one of eight states in the country where a human has been diagnosed with Chagas disease, a parasitic infection spread by bugs. Scientists are now calling on health authorities to declare the disease endemic in the United States. -
In a change from previous federal recommendations, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved this year's shots only for older people and those with underlying health conditions. -
The statewide network will provide an on-call certified nurse examiner to support workers at other hospitals through videoconferencing during sexual assault forensic exams. -
Naegleria fowleri lives in warm, fresh water and can enter the brain through the nose, where it causes inflammation and tissue death. Fewer than 200 people have contracted the amoeba since 1962, but infection is almost always fatal. -
The amoeba is a single-celled organism that lives in hot springs, lakes and other warm freshwater bodies. The Missouri health department says this is only the state's third case on record, but infections are nearly always fatal.
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Andrew Bailey's lawsuit, filed in Cole County Circuit Court, claims that Planned Parenthood is downplaying the safety issues of mifepristone. Planned Parenthood responded that Bailey has repeatedly "spread lies and disinformation to push his own anti-abortion agenda." -
Planned Parenthood Great Rivers opened its books for patients to make abortion appointments starting next week. It's the latest in a saga over abortion access after Missouri voters passed Amendment 3 last November. -
Both Missouri and Kansas have banned hormone therapy and other gender-affirming care for transgender youth under age 18. A conservative majority of the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a similar law on Wednesday, which local advocates say is "devastating." -
Republican lawmakers put a measure on the 2026 ballot that would not just cement an abortion ban in the Missouri Constitution, but would also prevent transgender youth from accessing gender-affirming health care. -
Newly elected Pope Leo XIV lived in St. Louis, Missouri, in the 1970s while studying to become a priest. He was in a parish near what is today the medical campus of St. Louis University
