Search results for

NPR's Patricia Neighmond reports on a new study of Medicare patients that shows elderly patients are getting better care than they did just three years ago. On a wide range of measures, those enrolled in Medicare showed significant improvement -- everything from getting the right treatment after a heart attack to getting pneumonia and flu vaccines.

Robert Siegel talks with Ross McSwain, retired regional editor for The San Angelo Standard-Times about Sam Lewis a promoter of armadillos. Mr. Lewis has died at the age of eighty. McSwain says when Lewis took his armadillos to London, the Queen Mother was quite taken with them.

NPR's Ivan Watson reports on the Islamist movement that now controls the local government in Pakistan's Northwest Frontier Province, along the border with Afghanistan. The new provincial government has launched a crackdown on what it terms immoral entertainment, including Western music and movies. Some in the region are comparing the government to the Taliban.

A hearing begins for two U.S. military pilots who bombed a Canadian unit last year in Afghanistan, killing four and wounding eight. At issue is whether the pilots' actions merit the criminal charges they face -- or constitute a mistake that should be treated less harshly. NPR's Michele Norris talks with Derek Stoffel of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

In his book Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling, author Ross King says the artist saw his commission to paint the Sistine Chapel as an attempt by enemies to set him up for failure. NPR's Michele Norris talks to King.

Prosecutors in Northern Virginia ask a juvenile court to rule that John Lee Malvo, 17, should be tried as an adult for the murder of FBI employee Linda Franklin. Malvo is one of two suspects in sniper-style shootings -- most in the Washington, D.C. area -- that left 13 people dead. NPR's Brian Naylor reports.

Stand-up comics can say pretty much anything these days -- no matter how obscene or offensive their material -- thanks in no small part to Lenny Bruce. In the late 1950s and early '60s, the iconoclastic comedian often found himself in trouble with the law for saying whatever was on his mind. NPR's Juan Williams reports on a new book detailing Bruce's legal battles.

Some say the real divide on the Korean peninsula is not between North and South but between young and old. Young South Koreans -- those too young to remember the Korean war -- favor rapprochement with the North. The older generation remains deeply suspicious of the North and favors the United States' get-tough approach. NPR's Eric Weiner reports from South Korea's capital, Seoul.

Recent corporate scandals and the fall in stock values hit the corporate liability insurance market hard. Lawsuits against directors and officers of corporate boards have driven up the cost of so-called D&O liability insurance, prompting some companies to flee the industry. NPR's David Schaper reports.

Relatives of seven people who died in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks sue the head of a federal victim compensation fund, accusing him of calculating and distributing money unfairly. NPR's Tovia Smith reports.