Brian Mann
Brian Mann is NPR's first national addiction correspondent. He also covers breaking news in the U.S. and around the world.
Mann began covering drug policy and the opioid crisis as part of a partnership between NPR and North Country Public Radio in New York. After joining NPR full time in 2020, Mann was one of the first national journalists to track the deadly spread of the synthetic opioid fentanyl, reporting from California and Washington state to West Virginia.
After losing his father and stepbrother to substance abuse, Mann's reporting breaks down the stigma surrounding addiction and creates a factual basis for the ongoing national discussion.
Mann has also served on NPR teams covering the Beijing Winter Olympics and the war in Ukraine.
During a career in public radio that began in the 1980s, Mann has won numerous regional and national Edward R. Murrow awards. He is author of a 2006 book about small town politics called Welcome to the Homeland, described by The Atlantic as "one of the best books to date on the putative-red-blue divide."
Mann grew up in Alaska and is now based in New York's Adirondack Mountains. His audio postcards, broadcast on NPR, describe his backcountry trips into wild places around the world.
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An engineering report in Oct. 2018 warned of "major structural damage" in the Florida building that collapsed last week. The next month, a town inspector said the building was in "very good shape."
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The 2018 report found major damage to the concrete structural slab below the pool deck and warned that extensive repairs would be needed soon. The mayor is considering evacuating a sister building.
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President Biden wants to eliminate sentencing disparities between crack and powder cocaine that led to the incarceration of far more Black and Hispanic Americans. Critics are skeptical of the reform.
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Researchers know how to curb the risks of overdose and disease among drug users, but policymakers are reluctant to allow public health measures that include needle exchanges and access to safer drugs.
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President Nixon called for an "all-out offensive" against drugs and addiction. The U.S. is now rethinking policies that led to mass incarceration and shattered families while drug deaths kept rising.
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Drug distributors have faced embarrassing revelations about their internal practices. One email shared by corporate executives described rural Americans addicted to opioids as "pillbillies."
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A diplomatic row has frozen U.S.-Mexican efforts to target drug cartels. American officials say illicit fentanyl from labs in Mexico is driving a surge in overdose deaths.
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Under a bankruptcy procedure prohibited by courts in part of the country, the Sacklers could be sheltered from opioid lawsuits even without declaring bankruptcy. Some states are crying foul.
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With the deadly opioid fentanyl pushing overdose deaths to record levels, federal officials hope buprenorphine will save lives in parts of the country where the drug is rarely prescribed.
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Researchers say cocaine, meth and other street drugs are increasingly contaminated with deadly synthetic opioids, contributing to a major spike in deaths.