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Why our changing climate is bad for your health

The Earth is getting hotter and extreme weather events are becoming more common. It’s bad news for our lives. We break down how climate change links to poor health.

Caught in the middle: When divorced parents use kids as pawns

When a child is emotionally manipulated by one parent to hate the other, the legal system and therapists grapple with how to help families repair their relationships. Here’s why so-called parental alienation cases are contentious.

Breathing in a deadly dust: How a drop of blood can help

A new tool may help to keep workers who breathe in silica dust safe from silicosis — at less than R50 a prick.

The cost of caring: Zithulele’s Ben Gaunt, one year later

In 2022, after a decade of service, Ben Gaunt, who led a team who transformed Zithulele Hospital in the Eastern Cape from a struggling public health facility into a poster child of excellence, left the facility. The drama, which followed the appointment of a controversial CEO, was well publicised. We spoke to Gaunt one year later.

#ToiletPaperPromises: Why Limpopo’s schools still have pit toilets

Nine years after a Grade R learner, Michael Komape, drowned in a pit toilet at his school in Limpopo, 2 334 schools in the province still have these structures on their premises. Here are the hits and misses of the education department’s efforts to get rid of them since — and what they can learn from India.

Seaside towns swallowed by sand: Somalians battle with climate change

Strong winds, trees being cut down and drought drive sand to pile up and swallow the houses of the ancient seaside town Hobyo, Somalia. Will promises to green the desert save families who have been forced to move before?

From Alexander Bay to Tshwane: Meet the health department’s Mrs Impossible

From growing up without a telephone to her appointment as the chief director of digital health systems in the national health department, the sweep of Milani Wolmarans’s life story is as wide as it is inspiring. Sean Christie spoke to her in Tshwane.

Up in smoke: The Black tobacco farmers British American Tobacco left behind

Some small-scale black tobacco farmers in Limpopo feel that the tobacco industry supported them under the guise of an upliftment programme, but then used them to fight against illicit tobacco trade. By 2021, the financial support dried up.

‘The world’s most neglected disease’: Why leprosy still runs rampant amongst Bangladeshi tea pickers

The WHO may have declared leprosy eliminated in 1998, but Bangladeshi tea pickers continue to be infected by the thousands.

Here’s what happens when healthcare becomes a weapon of war

Healthworkers are being attacked by Myanmar’s military — observers say it’s a tactic of war.

Meet Andy Gray, the ‘insider’s insider’ of SA drug policy

Pharmacy expert Andy Gray is the “insider’s insider” in South Africa’s public health sphere. Get to know him better here.

‘Retirement will come the day I’m buried’: Côte d’Ivoire grandmothers are left holding the...

For grandmothers across Côte d’Ivoire, climate change has had unexpected consequences. Once abundant with crop life, sustenance farming has become an unpredictable nightmare in the country’s villages. Young people of working age are now leaving villages in droves — without their children.

‘She has let go of the past’: In Peru, dance eases the pain of...

The Shining Path insurgents in the 80s and 90s led a trail of destruction through the lives of indigenous Peruvians. Now, women are using dance to heal the trauma.

Teenagers are sent to these camps to purge ‘The West’. They leave bruised and...

“Dhaqan celis” was a term used by Somalis that used to mean the practice of going back home to stay with relatives and learn more about your culture. But it’s taken on a whole new – much darker – meaning. Read more on this practice.
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What ChatGPT won’t tell you about Tlaleng Mofokeng

Get to know sexual and reproductive rights activist and doctor Tlaleng Mofokeng with our reporter Sean Christie.

‘I would lie and listen to my pain’: The multitasking mavericks fighting for a...

Morphine was first introduced to Uganda 30 years ago, but as the burden of cancer increases, thousands of people still lack access to even basic treatment for pain relief.