Search Results for: NPR

Unprepared: The Difficulty of Getting a Prescription for a Drug That Effectively Prevents HIV Infection

Illustration by Kjell Reigstad

Spenser Mestel | Longreads | December 2016 | 23 minutes (5,642 words)

 

I’m sitting on the examining table at Student Health in Iowa City, digging a nail into the cuticle of my right thumb, waiting for Robin, the physician’s assistant. Over the course of my grad school career, she’s walked me through a half dozen of these STI checks—swabbed my throat and rectum, handled my urine, drawn liters of blood, and sat patiently to answer my many questions.

She opens the door and sighs. “I’ve got good news and bad news.”

I hold my breath. My ex-boyfriend, Zac, has been my only partner since the last test a few months back, at the beginning of summer, while I was still in New York City. We both tested negative and always used condoms, but I’m remembering a conversation we had while eating in bed about a guy he’d gone on a couple of dates with a few months earlier. Zac was staring at the TV and fumbling with his hands.

“We were starting to hook up, and he told me that he’s HIV-positive.”

I’d dropped my samosa. “What?”

“No, no, no. He told me before anything happened. He said that him and his boyfriend had a threesome once, and the condom broke.”

A threesome and the condom broke.

I look down at my hand. At this point, I’m digging my nail into my knuckle.

“The good news is the tests came back negative.”

I exhale.

“The bad news is I can’t prescribe you Truvada.”

There is no rational reason for me to think I have HIV. I would have avoided this stress altogether if I weren’t interested in Truvada, a pill approved in 2012 to help prevent the contraction of HIV, also known as Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis, or PrEP. I’d heard about the drug at a party in New York and immediately looked it up on my phone. Of the 657 San Francisco residents the study followed for 32 months, zero tested positive for HIV.

“I want to prescribe it,” Robin says, pulling out a prescription pad, “believe me, but the doctor I work under won’t allow it, not until we have the right protocols.” She writes down a name and hands me the paper: “Try Dr. Nisly at River Landing. She runs an LGBT clinic on Tuesday nights.” In the past three years, she’s never referred me to the LGBT clinic, never even mentioned that there was one. As I fold the paper, I remember the first time I met Robin, right after I’d moved to this Midwestern college town from New York. I’d been on guard when she asked if I had sex with men or women or both. “Men,” I said, scanning her face for twitches, her voice for stutters. I waited for a loaded question or curt tone. They never came. Read more…

The Plight of the Overworked Nonprofit Employee

Longreads Pick

Timm looks at the situation that has become the norm at many mission-driven organizations with tight budgets, where staff are often required to work long, unpaid hours. But at what cost?

Source: The Atlantic
Published: Aug 24, 2016
Length: 11 minutes (2,801 words)

The Fight for the Future of NPR

Longreads Pick

Two decades ago, the median age of NPR’s audience was 45. Today it’s 54. Will it find a way to reach new, younger audiences?

Source: Slate
Published: Apr 10, 2016
Length: 17 minutes (4,435 words)

Unpregnant: The silent, secret grief of miscarriage

Longreads Pick

Alexandra Kimball on the isolation of suffering a miscarriage, and the missing language of grieving this loss.

Published: Dec 9, 2015
Length: 26 minutes (6,693 words)

Reinventing One of Scotland’s Most Unpronounceable Whiskies

No one knows why Bruichladdich whisky tastes the way it does, but plenty of people think they do. In Reynier’s view, the distillery’s proximity to a shallow bay makes a difference. (Bruichladdich is Gaelic for “raised beach.”) When the tide goes out, across the road, algae are exposed to the air, which influences the spirit as it matures, giving it a maritime tang.

Officially, the company also credits its distinctive tall, narrow pot stills, the oldest of which has been in use since 1881. But McEwan differs sharply. “The shape of the pot is not significant, in terms of flavor—this is a kind of fairy story,” he says. “It’s the artisanal skills of the whisky-maker.”

Kelefa Sanneh, writing in The New Yorker about a London wine dealer’s mission to revive the revered  Bruichladdich distillery, on the Scottish island of Islay. Sanneh’s piece ran in February 2013.

 

Read the story

Unprotected

Longreads Pick

Uncovering a legacy of sex abuse in competitive swimming.

Source: Outside
Published: Nov 13, 2014
Length: 52 minutes (13,166 words)

NPR's Nina Totenberg On What It Was Like To Be The Only Woman In The Newsroom

How did sources treat you differently than your male colleagues?

The bad news was you weren’t one of the guys so you didn’t chum it up with them and go drinking. The good news was they assumed you were young and stupid. I was young. I wasn’t stupid. They would very often say the most incredible things to me because they weren’t concentrating on the fact that I was concentrating on them.

I probably scored a number of scoops that way. It’s just hilarious. One time I was doing a story about junkets on Capitol Hill. I think Northwest [Airlines] had inaugurated a new line to Japan and Korea. They had taken on their maiden voyage most of the members of the Senate Commerce Committee, which of course controlled regulation of the airline industry.

So I did a bunch of interviews with people who went, and then I asked the people who didn’t go why they didn’t. I remember [Montana Democrat] Mike Mansfield said something of great integrity. He just said, “Don’t do that kind of thing.” But there was a senator, [New Hampshire Republican] Norris Cotton, who said, “Oriental food gives me the trots.” And that was the subhead in the story! It was just too good.

Nina Totenberg, interviewed by Adrienne LaFrance. Nina Totenberg’s tenure at NPR began nearly forty years ago, and since then her voice has become one of the most familiar on public radio. As LaFrance put it, “her work is so well known that NPR even sells a “Nina Totin’ Bag,” which pays homage to the legal affairs correspondent and pokes fun at public broadcasting for its classic pledge-drive gift.” Read more about public radio in the Longreads archive.

Photo: Wikimedia Commons

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Letter to Emily White at NPR All Songs Considered.

Longreads Pick

A professional musician calls for a rethinking of how we value (and pay) artists in the digital era:

“Rather, fairness for musicians is a problem that requires each of us to individually look at our own actions, values and choices and try to anticipate the consequences of our choices. I would suggest to you that, like so many other policies in our society, it is up to us individually to put pressure on our governments and private corporations to act ethically and fairly when it comes to artists rights. Not the other way around. We cannot wait for these entities to act in the myriad little transactions that make up an ethical life. I’d suggest to you that, as a 21-year old adult who wants to work in the music business, it is especially important for you to come to grips with these very personal ethical issues.”

Source: The Trichordist
Published: Jun 18, 2012
Length: 15 minutes (3,942 words)

NPR Amps Up: Can Vivian Schiller Build a Journalism Juggernaut? (2010)

NPR Amps Up: Can Vivian Schiller Build a Journalism Juggernaut? (2010)

NPR Amps Up: Can Vivian Schiller Build a Journalism Juggernaut? (2010)

Longreads Pick

Schiller has animated the place with the energy of renewed ambition, a rededication to producing serious journalism. Her strategy rests on three pillars: expand original reporting at the national and local levels; provide free access to public media content regardless of platform; and serve audiences of all backgrounds and interests. To do all that, she wants to work in partnership with NPR’s member stations as well as independent producers and some of the new nonprofit journalism units springing up around the country.

Author: Jill Drew
Published: Mar 1, 2010
Length: 23 minutes (5,935 words)