Six Journalists Probing Global Health Issues Win Reporting Contest

By: Emily Schult | 09/14/2016

The International Center for Journalists has named six journalists from around the world as winners of the 2016 Global Health Reporting Contest. They produced riveting stories, from profiles of pregnant women living in the heart of the Zika epidemic in Brazil to health workers traveling on bikes to distribute medicines in Cameroon.

The entries were selected from more than 150 submissions. The winners – from Brazil, Cameroon, China, India, Russia and Zimbabwe – will visit Washington, D.C., Atlanta and New York this fall as part of a 10-day study tour. They will meet global health experts and journalists who focus on medical issues. Each winner also receives a $1,000 cash prize. The contest is sponsored by Johnson & Johnson. In New York, they will be honored at an Awards Dinner featuring a panel discussion called, “Is It Too Late to Stop the Zika Pandemic?”

The winners:

Thumbnail

Brazil

Mariana Barros, an investigative reporter for Recife-based TV Jornal, produced a three-part series named “Diary of an Epidemic.” She takes an intimate look at the lives of pregnant women as they face the uncertainty and challenges of the Zika epidemic. Barros focuses on families in Pernambuco, an impoverished region where a record number of children were born with microcephaly, but there are few medical facilities to help them.
 

Thumbnail

Cameroon

Colette Patricia Ngo Ngouem’s “Trail of ‘Docta Basco,” published in the Yaounde-based daily Mutations, follows community health workers who travel on bicycles to remote villages where they provide preventive care. In “A Lifeline in the Far North,” she shows how motorcycle ambulances make it possible to quickly transfer emergency cases to health facilities in Cameroon’s far-northern region, saving lives.

 

Thumbnail

China

Ding Zeng’s “Ark Children, Vaccines, Ethiopia and China,” published in the Hong Kong-based Phoenix Weekly, looks at an app that sends mobile alerts to health-care workers when energy blackouts cause vaccine-storage cooling units to fail. The story explains how this new technology can save lives in remote and poverty-stricken areas by letting vaccinators know when vaccines are no longer effective.

 

Thumbnail

India

Rohan Singh investigated India’s efforts to improve health and living conditions for its swelling population. In “Ash Increasing Pollution and Health Hazards,” he looks at how Delhi’s poor are the biggest victims of pollution. In “Swachha Bharat Abhiyan: Reality Check,” Singh takes an in-depth look at an ambitious government program that has failed to deliver on a promise to provide sanitation and toilets to citizens across India.

 

Thumbnail

Russia

Daria Sarkisyan’s “Eternal Question: What is the Most Effective Birth Control?”published in Afisha Daily, offers audiences a detailed perspective on modern contraception strategies. In a story for the online magazine Wonderzine, “To Vaccinate or Not: Why Are Vaccinations Needed, and When to Do Them,” she provides up-to-date information on recommended vaccinations, while addressing arguments from vaccination opponents.

 

Thumbnail

Zimbabwe

Phyllis Mbanje’s story for Newsday, “Giving Birth in ‘Exile’ After Tokwe-Mukosi Disaster,” describes the challenges faced by pregnant women and children living in transit camps two years after flooding forced at least 20,000 people from their homes. In “To Legalise Abortion or Improve Access to Contraceptives,” she explores this controversial issue for Zimbabweans.

Latest News

A Reporter's Guide to The History of Tariffs

This piece was produced in collaboration with the Global Business Journalism program at Tsinghua University. The program is a partnership between ICFJ, Tsinghua University and Bloomberg News.

For most of human history, governments have taxed goods crossing their borders. Tariffs — taxes levied on imports or exports — have financed

Hans Staiger Award Winner Investigates Russian Soldiers Secretly Treated in Belarus Hospitals, Including Those Linked to War Crimes

Leaked data from the Russian Defense Ministry shook the story loose. A team of investigators found that during the first 21 months of the invasion of Ukraine, nearly 1,000 Russian soldiers were treated at Belarusian hospitals, including war crime suspects. These “secret patients,” as they were known, directly tied Belarus to Moscow’s war effort.

I Blew Up on TikTok with Journalism — Here's How You Can, Too

l'll never forget the day when an editor at the BBC told a 25-year-old me that journalists shouldn’t be on TikTok because “there’s so much misinformation on there.” By that point, I had maybe 10,000 followers on the platform, possibly more, and the comment stung. My TikToks, which had amplified my journalism as well as my passion for learning new languages, were well researched and I hoped the direct opposite of misinformation.