National

Reptiles like leopard geckos can bring Salmonella along with them.

Doctors Don't Always Ask About Pet-Related Health Risks

11:07am April 21, 2015

by Nancy Shute

People can pick up germs and parasites from their pets, and some of them can be nasty. Health care providers for all species could do a better job of communicating the risks, a study finds.

After initially recalling products made at its Oklahoma facility, Blue Bell is now asking retailers and customers to throw away or return all of its products currently on the market.

Blue Bell Widens Recall To All Of Its Products Over Listeria Worries

10:04am April 21, 2015

by Bill Chappell

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has called it "a complex and ongoing multistate outbreak of listeriosis occurring over an extended period of several years."

This spiral CT image of the chest shows a large malignant mass (purple) in one lung. A conventional chest X-ray could have missed this tumor, radiologists say.

Why Some Doctors Hesitate To Screen Smokers For Lung Cancer

10:39pm April 20, 2015

by Anders Kelto

Medicare now pays for some long-term smokers to get an annual test. These scans could save thousands of lives each year, but some doctors still worry risks outweigh benefits.

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National

'Post And Courier' Of Charleston, S.C., Wins Pulitzer For Public Service

8:34pm April 20, 2015

by Krishnadev Calamur

The newspaper's series examined why South Carolina is among the deadliest states for women in the United States. Anthony Doerr won the prize for fiction for All the Light We Cannot See.

President Lyndon B. Johnson signs the ESEA in 1965 with Kate Deadrich Loney, his first schoolteacher.

Senators Try To Revise No Child Left Behind — A Few Years Behind

7:57pm April 20, 2015

by Eric Westervelt

Tuesday, senators begin working out the details of a bipartisan update to the No Child Left Behind education law. The proposed revision would give states more control over school accountability.

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Syrian Government Believed To Be Behind Chlorine Gas Attack

7:56pm April 20, 2015

NPR's Robert Siegel talks with chemical weapons expert Amy Smithson about the use of chlorine gas as a weapon in Syria. She says it is a violation of the Chemical Weapons Convention.

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Setting The Record Straight On The Phrase 'Gateway Drug'

7:08pm April 20, 2015

Denise Kandel coined the term, often associated with marijuana, in a research paper 40 years ago. But her work suggested nicotine, not pot, was most likely to lead to the use of harder drugs.

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Geologists Dave Tucker (left) and Pete Stelling at the Mount Baker hot springs in Washington's Cascade Mountains. The springs are within the large tract of federal land that could soon be open for geothermal development.

In Northwest, A Push To Protect Forest As Geothermal Projects Near

6:23pm April 20, 2015

by Ashley Ahearn

The Forest Service is set to open more than 80,000 acres for clean, renewable geothermal power in Washington state. But environmentalists are worried about damage to streams and old-growth forests.

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Alex Rodriguez Closes In On 660 Homerun Record Set By Willie Mays

6:23pm April 20, 2015

NPR's Melissa Block talks with Mark Feinsand, Yankees beat writer with the New York Daily News, about Alex Rodriguez's game this year and how he is expected to surpass Willie Mays' 660 homerun record.

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Jayne Rowse (left) and April DeBoer with their four children, Jacob (from left), Rylee, Nolan and Ryanne at a news conference in March.

National

Meet The 'Accidental Activists' Of The Supreme Court's Same-Sex-Marriage Case

6:23pm April 20, 2015

by Nina Totenberg

The legal battle over same-sex marriage hits the Supreme Court next week. It's an extraordinarily high-stakes clash, but the men and women at the center of it see themselves as incredibly ordinary.

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