An extraordinary new series by @gingerthompson.bsky.social w/ Doris Burke: Sick in a Hospital Town
Read part one: The Business of Care
As Phoebe Memorial Grew, the Health of Albany, Georgia, Declined
📽️ WATCH: Our reporting has shown that recent policy changes at the VA are having an impact on working conditions and on patient care, but we need your help to understand the full picture.
If you recently left the VA, here’s how you can reach us:
https://propub.li/4oz9bWL
A line that has aged very, very well
@seattletimes-rss.bsky.social Found this in a secondhand bookstore in Mexico City. Extremely belated congratulations on some very fine work.
Citizens, crying kids, pregnant women, people who aren't the target...it doesn't seem to matter who's inside the car when immigration officers want to make an arrest. They smash the window anyway
@mckenziefunk.com & I tracked these arrests all over the U.S. projects.propublica.org/trump-ice-sm...
After six years of adding medical staff, the VA this year is down more than 600 doctors and about 1,900 nurses. The number of doctors on staff has declined each month since President Donald Trump took office. The agency also lost twice as many nurses as it hired between January and June, records viewed by ProPublica show.
Trump admin says everything is hunky-dory at the VA.
But we found that the number of doctors at VA has dropped each month since Trump took office.
Nurses are way down too
We got the records.
www.propublica.org/article/vete...
by @davidarmstrongx.bsky.social @vernalcoleman.bsky.social and me.
NEW: Doctors and Nurses Reject VA Jobs Under Trump, by @davidarmstrongx.bsky.social @ericumansky.bsky.social @vernalcoleman.bsky.social
Update
ProPublica obtained records showing how a DOGE software engineer with no health care or government experience created an AI model to identify contracts to kill at the VA.
@bxroberts.org takes us through what we learned when we asked experts to review the model’s underlying instructions and code ⤵️
That ProPublica story leading to some real impact in Congress. Another great one by @vernalcoleman.bsky.social
www.propublica.org/article/doge...
NEW: Following a ProPublica investigation into how DOGE had developed an error-prone AI tool to determine which VA contracts should be killed, a trio of lawmakers said the Trump administration continues to “stonewall” their requests for details.
By @bxroberts.org & @vernalcoleman.bsky.social
“I think that mistakes were made,” said Sahil Lavingia, who worked at DOGE for nearly two months, about the AI tool he developed. “I’m sure mistakes were made. Mistakes are always made.”
By @bxroberts.org and @vernalcoleman.bsky.social
THREAD: An ex-DOGE engineer with no government or medical experience used AI to identify which Veterans Affairs contracts to kill, labeling them as “MUNCHABLE.”
@vernalcoleman.bsky.social @ericumansky.bsky.social and I got the code. Here’s what it tells us 1/
That’s a lot of presumption. But even if you’re right, the solution to the issue you’re presuming exists is for people to read the whole article. Or rather, to read more carefully.
If reading this article informed your opinion of the actions it describes, then it is not irrelevant.
Many of the federal workers being forced out by Trump are Black women who spent decades building a career of government service, only to see those careers shattered in a sudden purge.
By @davidmcswane.bsky.social
And because @bxroberts.org knows his way around an LLM, he talked to experts and the person who wrote the prompts (!) and broke down all of the issues piece-by-piece with @vernalcoleman.bsky.social
www.propublica.org/article/insi...
And for anyone who wants to dig into just how flawed this AI tool was in concept and execution, @bxroberts.org and @vernalcoleman.bsky.social talked to a bunch of experts to drill down on the code itself:
Latest from me, @bxroberts.org and @ericumansky.bsky.social
Thanks to my old North Carolina colleague @barryyeoman.com for highlighting this great work from @propublica.org and several others.
Reach out anytime.
On Tuesday, @vernalcoleman.bsky.social and I revealed that VA officials across the country have been warning that DOGE and the admin's cuts are hurting veterans' care.
Today, a half-dozen Congress members, mostly vets, demanded accountability.
www.propublica.org/article/vete...
“There are real-life dangerous impacts for veterans,” said @deluzio.house.gov.
NEW: Democratic Lawmakers Blast Trump Administration’s VA Cuts After ProPublica Investigation @vernalcoleman.bsky.social @ericumansky.bsky.social
NEW: The rate of sepsis in Houston surged 63% after Texas banned abortion.
In the Dallas-Fort Worth area, where hospital leaders empowered doctors to intervene before patients’ conditions worsened, it rose just 29%.
NEW: The Great Lakes hold 95% of all the surface freshwater in the United States.
Severe cuts have decimated the NOAA Great Lakes lab.
Scientists worry they’ve lost the ability to protect the public from toxic algal blooms, which can kill animals and sicken people.
My story for @propublica.org
NEW: The Trump administration’s slashing of budgets and staff have Great Lakes scientists concerned that they have lost the ability to protect the public from toxic algal blooms, which can kill animals and sicken people.
By @annaleighclark.bsky.social
NEW: After the VA began axing jobs, Secretary Doug Collins said vets would "notice a change for the better.” But internal warnings show the cuts have led to widespread chaos, including the disruption of "life saving cancer trials." w/ @ericumansky.bsky.social www.propublica.org/article/trum...
NEW: Trump has said he loves veterans & will “take care of them.”
His cuts to the VA have led to widespread chaos and some vets have been thrown off cancer trials.
@ericumansky.bsky.social & @vernalcoleman.bsky.social:
www.propublica.org/article/trum...
NEW INVESTIGATION from me and @vernalcoleman.bsky.social:
Internal emails show doctors and others at VA hospitals around the country begging for help as cuts hurt veterans' care, including "live-saving cancer trials."
www.propublica.org/article/trum...
