Renée Montagne of NPR and Nina Martin of ProPublica to Accept Award at Academy Gala on June 12
New York (May 15, 2018) – The New York Academy of Medicine will present ProPublica and NPR with its inaugural Health Equity Journalism Prize at its annual Gala on June 12, 2018 at Cipriani 25 Broadway. Established to recognize the importance of bringing to light the deep disparities that prevent so many people from enjoying a long and healthy life, the prize celebrates journalists whose work tackles issues of equity including the structural and symbolic barriers to good health.
The award recognizes ProPublica and NPR’s joint series “Lost Mothers,” which examines maternal mortality and life-threatening pregnancy-related complications in the United States. Nina Martin of ProPublica and Renée Montagne of NPR will accept the award on behalf of the team behind the series, which also includes Adriana Gallardo and Annie Waldman of ProPublica.
“The Academy is extremely pleased to honor ProPublica and NPR with the inaugural Health Equity Journalism Prize for their groundbreaking ‘Lost Mothers’ series,” said Academy President Dr. Judith A. Salerno, MD, MS. “All of us at the Academy have found the series to be extremely moving as well as vitally important in helping to move the issue of maternal mortality and its deep disparities to the forefront of public awareness.”
"Lost Mothers" came out of a unique collaboration between ProPublica and NPR and is an extraordinary multi-media series illuminating the maternal mortality crisis in the U.S. Told through in-depth reporting as well as narratives from families who lost loved ones, this moving series highlights the issue of preventable death and the staggering inequity and death rates for black women. The series has been honored with a George Polk Award, a Peabody Award, the 2018 Goldsmith Prize for investigative journalism, and the Council on Contemporary Families Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in explanatory reporting.
Nina Martincovers sex and gender issues for the nonprofit news organization ProPublica. Before joining ProPublica in 2013, she held editing and reporting positions at San Francisco magazine, the Washington Post, the International Herald Tribune, and the Baltimore Sun. She was a senior editor at Health magazine and the founding editor of BabyCenter's print edition. She holds degrees from Princeton and Northwestern and is based in Berkeley, CA.
“We've been humbled and deeply gratified by the impact this project has had over the past year among medical providers, researchers and lawmakers. Thank you for this recognition of our work,” Martin said.
Renée Montagne, one of the best-known names in public radio, is a Special Correspondent and Host for NPR News. From 2004 to 2016, Montagne co-hosted NPR's Morning Edition, the most widely heard radio news program in the U.S., with more than 14 million weekly listeners. Montagne has worked with every desk at NPR News—National, Foreign, Science, Arts, and Investigative—since she, along with Robert Siegel, became co-host of All Things Considered in 1987. Montagne graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of California, Berkeley. Her career includes teaching broadcast writing at New York University's Graduate Department of Journalism (now the Carter Institute).
“What an honor to be the inaugural recipients of this important new prize! It also honors those who shared their stories of lost loved ones and allowed us to make public a private tragedy, in hopes of sparing other mothers and families unspeakable pain. Thank you,” Montagne said.
“In addition to launching this new award, the Academy will also open the nomination process for 2019,” Dr. Salerno added.
The entry form for the 2019 Health Equity Journalism Prize is now open, with submissions and nominations being accepted through January 31, 2019. The prize will be awarded each year to a journalist, or team of journalists, who write or produce one or more stories that unearth and examine health equity issues with a focus on disparities between populations that affect health. With the understanding that health happens outside the doctor’s office, eligible stories should address multiple determinants of health and their influence. Additional criteria apply.
About The New York Academy of Medicine
The New York Academy of Medicine advances solutions that promote the health and well-being of people in cities worldwide.
Established in 1847, The New York Academy of Medicine continues to address the health challenges facing New York City and the world’s rapidly growing urban populations. We accomplish this through our Institute for Urban Health, home of interdisciplinary research, evaluation, policy, and program initiatives; our world class historical medical library and its public programming in history, the humanities and the arts; and our Fellows program, a network of more than 2,000 experts elected by their peers from across the professions affecting health. Our current priorities are healthy aging, disease prevention, and eliminating health disparities. For more information, visit www.nyam.org.
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