Rigid rules at methadone clinics are jeopardizing patients' path to recovery from opioid addiction

A STAT investigation shows that many of the nation's methadone clinics rely on controlling and punitive strategies that make it harder, not easier, for patients like Rebecca Smith (above) to maintain their recovery. Read Part 2 of the War on Recovery series.

By Lev Facher

"It's been over five years, and you're gonna do this to me? I said, y'all doing stuff like this makes people go out there and relapse. It's like you don't care."

Rebecca Smith

former medical assistant whose take-home methadone doses were suspended

Adobe

Hemophilia gene therapies arrived after 40 years of struggle. Where are the patients?

For four decades, researchers and companies searched for ways to replace the broken blood-clotting genes that cause hemophilia, a multibillion-dollar effort designed to turn a chronic, sometimes debilitating disease into a curable one. Why have the first two gene therapies been met with crickets? Read more.

By Jason Mast

Scott Olson/Getty Images

Amid the battle over abortion rights, a failure to agree on how to define abortion

There's a major problem underlying the debate over who can access abortion, for what reasons, and when: Across the country, there's widespread disagreement — among doctors, lawmakers, and the public — about what an abortion is. Read more.

By Saima May Sidik

More great reads from STAT this week

Exclusive: UnitedHealth is on a buying spree of outpatient surgery centers
Medicare couldn't cover Wegovy for weight loss. But now that it's also a heart drug, the door is open
Hospitals struggle to validate AI-generated clinical summaries. 'It's a bit chaotic'
Opinion: No parent who has seen the children I've treated for measles would refuse a vaccine
Inside a push to create an NIH office for post-infection chronic illness