Sarah Varney

Sarah Varney was a senior correspondent for KFF Health News until August 2023.

@SarahVarney4

Nursing Homes Bleed Staff as Amazon Lures Low-Wage Workers With Prime Packages

KFF Health News Original

Add nursing homes to the list of industries jolted by Amazon’s handsome hourly wages. Enticed by an average starting pay rate of $18 an hour and the potential for benefits and signing bonuses, low-wage workers are fleeing entry-level elder care for jobs packing boxes.

Watch: No Extra Resources for Children Orphaned by Covid

KFF Health News Original

Grieving children face grave risks to their well-being, both in the short and long term. But there is no concerted government effort to help the estimated 140,000 children who have lost a parent in the pandemic.

What Will It Take to Boost Vaccinations? The Scene From Kentucky’s Back Roads

KFF Health News Original

With Kentucky in the grip of a covid surge, public health workers are taking their vaccination campaign house to house and church to church, trying to outmaneuver the fantastical tales spread on social media and everyday hurdles of hardship and isolation.

The Pandemic Almost Killed Allie. Her Community’s Vaccination Rate Is 45%.

KFF Health News Original

As the delta variant overtakes Mississippi and other undervaccinated parts of the country, one 13-year-old girl’s experience with covid and MIS-C shows a community’s reluctance to embrace public health precautions and continued vulnerability to the pandemic.

Long Drives, Air Travel, Exhausting Waits: What Abortion Requires in the South

KFF Health News Original

Restrictive abortion regulations enacted across the South require women to drive across state lines to find safe services. With the U.S. Supreme Court set to hear a challenge to Roe v. Wade, abortion rights defenders say long drives and wait times could become the norm across much of America.

Why is the South the Epicenter of Anti-Abortion Fervor?

KFF Health News Original

The Supreme Court, come autumn, will consider a Mississippi law that bans nearly all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. That’s hardly the most restrictive abortion law passed in the South. How did anti-abortion views become concentrated in the South?

The Making of Reluctant Activists: A Police Shooting in a Hospital Forces One Family to Rethink American Justice

KFF Health News Original

In 2015, Houston police officers stepped into Alan Pean’s hospital room, closed the door and shot him through the chest. Nearly six years later, his survival has brought the Pean family a wrenching legacy and conflicted sense of purpose.

Anti-Immigrant Vitriol Complicates Vaccine Rollout in Southern States

KFF Health News Original

Inoculating the millions of undocumented workers who produce America’s agricultural bounty will be key to achieving herd immunity against covid-19. But garnering the trust of these workers is proving complicated, particularly in the South, where the last four years have been marked by workplace raids and anti-immigrant vitriol.

Lost on the Frontline

KFF Health News Original

“Lost on the Frontline” is an ongoing project by Kaiser Health News and The Guardian that aims to document the lives of health care workers in the U.S. who died from COVID 19, and to investigate why so many are victims of the disease.

America’s Obesity Epidemic Threatens Effectiveness of Any COVID Vaccine

KFF Health News Original

Vaccines engineered to protect the public from influenza, hepatitis B, tetanus and rabies are less effective for obese people, leaving them more vulnerable to serious illness. As scientists race to develop a COVID-19 vaccine, experts say obesity could prove an impediment — a sobering prospect for a nation in which nearly half of all adults are obese.