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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The Biden administration points to fentanyl as the major culprit for the increase in deaths. Officials unveiled a new one-year strategy to reduce the number of fatalities from drug overdoses.
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Companies that sold or distributed opioid medications face huge legal, financial and public relations peril. Critics say shareholders, not CEOs, will pay the price.
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Two dozen states had hoped to sue the owners of Purdue Pharma for their alleged role in the opioid crisis. But a federal bankruptcy has judge put the brakes on — again — until April 21.
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Attorneys, forensic analysts and other financial experts working for Purdue Pharma spent nearly two years looking for evidence of wrongdoing by the Sacklers. Critics want the findings made public.
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Under a bankruptcy plan filed late Monday, the OxyContin maker would pay $500 million up front, promising billions in future payments. Twenty-four states rejected the proposal.
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The CDC says hospitals saw a lot more emergency cases involving drug overdoses, as well as mental health crises and suicide attempts. Many emergency departments weren't ready.
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Lawmakers are blasting the nation's biggest drug makers and distributors for looking to use a pandemic tax-break loophole to write down losses coming from settlements linked to the opioid epidemic.
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Black Americans with addiction face "pervasive and continuing systemic racism" and often struggle to gain access to treatments that prevent fatal overdoses.
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Many drug rehab programs use aggressive sales techniques, price-gouge patients and provide substandard care. The system often pushes people struggling with addiction into debt, but not recovery.
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The state opened a mass vaccination site at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx on Friday and is working with Black pastors to overcome worries about vaccine safety.