STAT wins fourth Polk Award for reporting on impact of Trump on health

Dear Readers,

I'm thrilled to share that STAT has won a prestigious George Polk Award for documenting the Trump administration's shakeup of the FDA, scientific research, and public health.

The Polk Award honors STAT reporter Lizzy Lawrence for chronicling the upending of the FDA, Americans' health care protector. It also recognizes journalists across STAT for, among other achievements, the 10-part series "American Science, Shattered," and the 17-part "MAHA Diagnosis." Throughout the year, we published a breathtaking 86 scoops, among hundreds more stories, about changes at U.S. health and science agencies.

This is STAT's fourth Polk Award over the last five years — a testament to our enterprising, deeply sourced, and collaborative team. No other news outlet our size has been so frequently honored in recent history.

Helen Branswell won for public service for her prescient coverage of Covid-19; the team of Matthew Herper, Adam Feuerstein, and Damian Garde won in the medical reporting category for their investigation revealing that Biogen used an FDA back channel to win approval for a controversial treatment for Alzheimer's disease. And just last year, Lizzy, Bob Herman, Tara Bannow, and Casey Ross won in the health care reporting category for their impactful "Health Care's Colossus" series, which showed how UnitedHealth Group wields its unrivaled physician empire to boost its profits and expand its influence.

I also want to congratulate our sister publication, The Boston Globe, which won a Polk Award this year for probing the case of Rümeysa Öztürk, a Turkish graduate student at Tufts University who was arrested by masked immigration agents.

We feel we are meeting our mission to break news and find clarity at a time of so much change — with rigor and impartiality. Readers seem to agree. Over the past year, subscribers have flocked to our site in record numbers. Just this month, we've published a number of deep-dive stories, including a look at why a big pharma company believes a decades-old drug can treat Alzheimer's, an analysis of a looming crackdown on telehealth companies like Hims and drug compounders, and an examination of one state's partnership with a startup that will use AI to renew drug prescriptions.

If you're not a subscriber, I hope you'll sign up — and view this Polk recognition as the latest demonstration of the value of our reporting. Even though we punch above our weight, our work is costly, and we rely on subscribers to fund it. A subscription gets you access to all of our coverage, including exclusive stories and subscriber-only newsletters, as well as discounts for in-person and virtual attendance at events around the country, such as our Breakthrough East Summit in New York City on March 19. For a limited time, you can get 50% off an annual STAT+ subscription with code FEB2026.

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I pledge to you we will not let up on delivering stories you can trust. Feel free to reach out to me if you have any feedback. I'm at rick.berke@statnews.com.

Sincerely,