Rebecca Hersher
Rebecca Hersher (she/her) is a reporter on NPR's Science Desk, where she reports on outbreaks, natural disasters, and environmental and health research. Since coming to NPR in 2011, she has covered the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, embedded with the Afghan army after the American combat mission ended, and reported on floods and hurricanes in the U.S. She's also reported on research about puppies. Before her work on the Science Desk, she was a producer for NPR's Weekend All Things Considered in Los Angeles.
Hersher was part of the NPR team that won a Peabody award for coverage of the Ebola epidemic in West Africa, and produced a story from Liberia that won an Edward R. Murrow award for use of sound. She was a finalist for the 2017 Daniel Schorr prize; a 2017 Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting fellow, reporting on sanitation in Haiti; and a 2015 NPR Above the Fray fellow, investigating the causes of the suicide epidemic in Greenland.
Prior to working at NPR, Hersher reported on biomedical research and pharmaceutical news for Nature Medicine.
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Under the agreement hammered out in 2015, the first day that countries can reverse the promises they made is Nov. 4, 2019. It will be another year before the American withdrawal is official. -
Scientists have released the most detailed look yet at where and how the U.S. government helps residents retreat from flood-prone areas. Climate change is making such questions more urgent. -
The way we produce food and manage land must change radically if humans hope to avoid catastrophic global temperature rise, according to a new report by the United Nations panel on climate change. -
The water in the Gulf of Mexico is hot and the Mississippi River is high. That could spell disaster for Louisiana. -
NOAA forecasts that two to four major hurricanes will form this year in the Atlantic. But even an average year can cause record-breaking damage, as storms get bigger and wetter. -
The term "100-year flood" can be confusing and misleading, scientists, local emergency officials and homeowners all agree. Experts say there's a better way to communicate about flood risk. -
The federal government spends billions of dollars each year helping communities rebuild after disasters and to prevent future damage. But that money isn't always allocated to those who need it most. -
According to the government's most comprehensive assessment to date, climate change has already damaged American infrastructure and cost both money and lives. -
The city itself — skyscrapers, homes and factories — snagged the moist air of Hurricane Harvey and caused more rain to fall. Two new studies detail how humans are making hurricane flooding worse. -
Hurricane Florence — large, slow and full of moisture — is threatening to inundate the Southeast. It's a type of storm that's getting more likely to form.
