Getting fertility care is complex. It can be harder if you have sickle cell disease
Teonna Woolford has always wanted to have six kids. “I don’t know where that number came from. I just felt like four wasn’t enough,” Woolford said. “And I never wanted an odd number of children. I don’t know. Six is a good number.” https://cpa.ds.npr.org/s4780019/audio/2022/06/sickelcell-fertility-feature-web.mp3 Listen to this story here. Woolford was born with sickle cell […]
Death certificates of 5 men killed in East St. Louis riots found in state archives
It was a tale told by older generations to the younger generations, of men shot and killed and their bodies tossed into a creek during one of the fiercest race riots in the country. That tale was carried across the Mississippi River by those trying to escape the violence and through the generations of African […]
Sickle cell patients face a double whammy: Systemic racism and a crippling disease
INDIANAPOLIS — Gary Gibson has a clear memory of his first conversation with his future wife Brenda Williams back in 1973. “Hello, my name is Brenda,” was the first thing Gibson remembers her saying. The second was, “I have sickle cell disease.” “I was like, sickle what?” Gibson said. https://cpa.ds.npr.org/s4780019/audio/2022/06/sicklecelldisease-story1-lackofresources-web.mp3 Listen to this story here. […]
Champaign to host annual Juneteenth festival at Douglass Park on Saturday
CHAMPAIGN — On Saturday, Chambanites can celebrate the end of slavery at Douglass Park with a bouncy house, photo booth, small business fair and more. Champaign Park District coordinator Robert White helped organize the Juneteenth event. He remembers the first time he learned about Juneteenth from his fraternity brother in college. “It was shocking because […]
Sunday marks Juneteenth’s second year as a state holiday – and over 150 years of Illinois emancipation days
URBANA — This Sunday marks the second year that Juneteenth will be an official state and federal holiday. Juneteenth celebrates the day in 1865 when Union troops marched into Galveston, Texas and forced the Confederate state to free the enslaved. Slavery existed in Illinois too, despite its status as a free state. “Whether we’re talking […]
A new poll shows Illinois GOP voters still back Trump
Former President Donald Trump wields a powerful spell over Illinois Republicans with a majority declaring him as their top choice for the White House in 2024 and even more believing legally he should still be there. More than two-thirds of the state’s GOP voters believe Trump actually won the 2020 election. And nearly nine out […]
One year later, farmers of color are still waiting on billions of federal relief dollars
The American Rescue Plan promised $4 billion in debt relief to “socially disadvantaged farmers.” But a swarm of lawsuits from banks and white farmers alleging discrimination has put the aid on hold. Barbara Norman remembers exactly how she felt when she first opened the letter from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. It was a cold, […]
‘Jelani Day’ missing persons bill signed into law
SPRINGFIELD — Gov. JB Pritzker has signed the “Jelani Day” bill into law, amending the Missing Persons Identification Act in hopes of preventing a repeat of what the Day family experienced last year. When Jelani Day went missing, his body was not found for nearly two weeks. Once found, Day’s remains went unidentified for three […]
Youngest of 10 Buffalo shooting victims being laid to rest
SYRACUSE, N.Y. — A 32-year-old woman who was the youngest of the 10 Black people killed at a Buffalo supermarket was remembered as big-hearted and quick with a laugh before her funeral. Final goodbyes for Roberta Drury were set to take place Saturday morning at the Assumption Church in Syracuse, not far from where she […]
Why some hospitals have stopped using race-based calculations for kidney disease
INDIANAPOLIS — If it wasn’t for Crystal Moore’s hoodie and car, people probably wouldn’t be able to tell her life is hanging by a thread. Her black Nissan sedan has signs plastered on the windows that read: “Kidney Donor Needed!” The signs include a picture of Moore and a QR code that leads to her […]
In Buffalo, Biden mourns victims, says ‘evil will not win’
BUFFALO — President Joe Biden mourned with Buffalo’s grieving families on Tuesday, then exhorted the nation to reject what he angrily labeled the poison of white supremacy. He said the nation must “reject the lie” of the racist “replacement theory” espoused by the shooter who killed 10 Black people at a supermarket. Biden declared that […]
Black farmers have lost $326 billion worth of farmland, study says
For the first time, researchers have assigned a value to the Black-owned farmland lost over the past century. Throughout the 20th century, Black farmers in the U.S. were forced to give up millions of acres of farmland. A new study puts a number to that loss — $326 billion. Discriminatory lending practices at the federal […]
Experts, advocates stress importance of cultural bias training in improving pregnancy care access for immigrants
This article is the third in a series about the access of pregnancy care for immigrants in Champaign. You can read part one here and part two here. Though a language barrier may be the most obvious barrier to pregnancy care access, experts and advocates say cultural barriers are just as big of an issue […]
Immigrant women in Champaign share stories of pregnancy care access
This article is the second in a series about the access of pregnancy care for immigrants in Champaign. You can read part one here and part three here. Teresa Rodriguez Teresa Rodriguez is another Champaign County resident who has experienced language and cultural barriers. Rodriguez is from Mexico City. She said when she started looking […]
What we know about the victims of the Buffalo shooting
They were grandmothers, fathers, sons and sisters. Some were charity volunteers. Many had deep roots in their community, relied on by their families but also by friends and strangers. They lost their lives on Saturday as they carried out the most essential of tasks: getting food for themselves and others, at the Tops Friendly Markets […]