Palestinian children queue outside a tent for the second phase of polio vaccination at Abdel Aziz Rantissi hospital in Gaza City's Nasr district on Saturday. Omar Al-Qattaa/AFP via Getty Images hide caption
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Marburg can be an exceptionally deadly virus. An outbreak in Rwanda is being handled with "unprecedented" success, say public health experts. In this photo from a 2014 Marburg outbreak in Kenya, a medical worker in protective gear carries a meal to a man quarantined in an isolation tent after coming into contact with a virus carrier. Ben Curtis/AP hide caption
This former NPR intern shows off our DIY mosquito costume. Ben de la Cruz/NPR hide caption
Ivana Likbiri, an 18-month-old Lebanese baby who got injured during an Israeli airstrike in southern Lebanon, is hospitalized at Geitaoui Hospital's burn unit, in Beirut, on Oct. 18. Ali Khara for NPR hide caption
Dr. Richard Cash devoted much of his life to improving health care in poor countries. He played a critical role in the testing and implementation of oral rehydration therapy for patients suffering from diarrheal diseases — giving them a mixture of water, salts and sugar. Discussing this intervention, he said, "Simple doesn't mean second class." Kent Dayton hide caption
The "Pink Wheels" team in the Pakistani town of Gujranwala consists of female officers who ride pink scooters to respond to complaints from women about domestic violence and sexual assault. The officers stand in front of the "Women's Enclave," a new kind of police station, staffed by women and intended for women who want to file such complaints. At right is Tayyiba Hameed, 32, who is on the staff of the Women's Enclave. Veengas hide caption
Garment workers are shouting slogans as they protest to mark May Day in Dhaka, Bangladesh, on May 1, 2024. (Photo by Kazi Salahuddin Razu/NurPhoto via Getty Images) Kazi Salahuddin Razu/NurPhoto via Getty Images/NurPhoto hide caption
This 2014 photo made available by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows a feeding female Anopheles funestus mosquito. James Gathany/AP/CDC hide caption
An aerial photograph from 2023 of the Rusayo camp for internally displaced people on the outskirts of Goma in the East of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Hundreds of thousands of Congolese have found refuge around Goma after fleeing fighting further north. Two new reports document a 'staggering' increase in rapes over the past year. Alexis Huguet/AFP via Getty Images hide caption
Stephen Nzioka works on his farm in Miu, Machakos County, Kenya. A changing climate took a toll on his harvests — until a weekly text message gave him insights into the week's weather and the best farming strategies. Khadija Farah for NPR hide caption
Toyin Salami of Lagos, Nigeria, with her 4-year-old daughter, Kudirat. Her husband, Saheed, tends to two of their other children. "It's hard to get food, let alone nutritious food," she says. Sope Adelaja for NPR hide caption
From left: Emma Rady Wanroy and Hannah Johns, who were each adopted from China by U.S. parents. Wanroy, who has become a therapist specializing in working with other adoptees, cautions against narratives that adoption is a happy ending: “Adoptees have all these dangling questions that hang above them that we don't really get answered ever.” Johns, raised in Texas after being found on a street corner in eastern China, says, “I can be grateful, and I can have a great, great relationship with my parents. But I can also still be critical of the systems that caused my adoption." From left: Emma Rady Wanroy; Hannah Johns hide caption
China ends transnational adoptions -- some adoptees say they're relieved
Abrar Saleh Ali, 17, arrived at the Milé refugee camp in Eastern Chad in early September, after the civil war in Sudan destroyed her home and she was separated from her family. (Her dad had died earlier from an illness.) It took months for her to walk across the country and reach the camp. Along the way she was robbed of all her belongings and found out that her sister had been killed. Claire Harbage/NPR hide caption
Sister Rosita Milesi is the global laureate of the 2024 Nansen Refugee Award. She calls the honor "a recognition of all the people who helped me, who participated in my journey — especially the refugees that I had the opportunity to assist and accompany and who have always taught me lessons of hope and faith that fueled my own journey." Marina Calderon/UNHCR hide caption
A young child is restrained before receiving a vaccination for polio in Deir el-Balah in the central Gaza Strip on Sept. 4 during the first round of a massive polio vaccination campaign led by the United Nations. Eyad Baba/AFP via Getty Images hide caption
Left: A woman in Chad has spent 13 days at a malnutrition clinic seeking treatment for her 15-month-old child. Right: Flooding in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene in Florida. Claire Harbage/NPR; Joe Raedle/Getty Images hide caption
This Diwali Barbie was released on Oct. 4 — and has already sold out on Mattel's website. Does the doll reflect a different view of beauty, as Mattel claims — an Indian view?
Rafael Ortega / Mattel Inc.
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Melinda French Gates, billionaire philanthropist and founder of Pivotal, in Paris in 2021. Since leaving the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation earlier this year, French Gates has committed $1 billion towards women and girls. LUDOVIC MARIN/Getty Images hide caption
Smallpox and mpox are related diseases — and the eradication of the former inadvertently creating an opening for the latter. At left: An illustration from 1884 depicts smallpox pustules on the face and hand of a woman. At right: A 1997 photograph shows the palms of a woman who contracted mpox during an outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images; CDC/Image Point FR/BSIP/Universal Images Group via Getty Images
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The now-demolished Agbogbloshie Scrapyard in Accra, Ghana, once received about 15,000 tons of electronic waste each year, making it one of the largest e-waste processing sites in Africa. Muntaka Chasant hide caption
Doctors attempt to resuscitate a victim of shelling at the Al Nao Hospital in Omdurman, Republic of the Sudan on September 5. The victim was later pronounced dead. Luke Dray for NPR hide caption
In this 2014 photo, a Kenyan medical worker from the Infection Prevention and Control unit at a Nairobi hospital wears full gear when bringing a meal to a man in quarantine in isolation housing after coming into contact with a carrier of the Marburg virus. Ben Curtis/AP hide caption
Shailaja Paik is one of the 2024 MacArthur '"genius grant" recipients. She is a historian of modern India who writes about caste and gender, shedding light on the unseen lives of women from the Dalit caste — referred to as "untouchables." MacArthur Fellows Program hide caption