KHN and Guardian US Win Batten Medal for
“Lost on the Frontline”
The Year-Long
Investigative Project Chronicles the Lives of More than 3,600 Health Care
Workers Who Died of COVID-19
The News Leaders
Association (NLA) awarded KFF’s Kaiser Health News (KHN) and Guardian US
the 2021 Batten Medal for Coverage of the Coronavirus Pandemic for their
year-long “Lost on the
Frontline” investigation documenting the lives of more than
3,600 health care workers in the U.S. who died of COVID-19 after
contracting the disease on the job.
The project honored
their lives and asked, “Did so many have to die?” by investigating the
circumstances of their exposure, examining the sometimes-unnecessary
risks borne by those on the front lines of care.
The Batten
Medal is one of the highest honors awarded by the NLA,
recognizing coverage of the pandemic that reflects the previously
unthinkable challenges that newsrooms had to overcome in the face of this
once-in-a-generation crisis, named in memory of James K. Batten, a
reporter, editor and ultimately Knight Ridder’s chief executive officer.
The project began in
April 2020 after the death of Frank Gabrin, the first emergency room
doctor known to have died of COVID-19. A reporter for the KHN/Guardian
project obtained text messages about Gabrin’s deep concerns about
shortages of personal protective equipment as he treated a crush of
COVID-19 patients in New York City and northern New Jersey. Yet in the
days after his death, the ER chiefs at his hospitals offered
full-throated denials of any PPE problems.
From there, the project
documented the lives and COVID-related deaths of health care workers,
many of whom faced daily risks that employers charged with protecting
them were often quick to dismiss or deny.
As part of the project,
more than 70 reporters spent nearly a year filing public records
requests, cross-connecting governmental and private data sources,
scouring obituaries and online posts. Frequently, relatives spoke about
their deceased family members with the team for the first time.
Ultimately, the team
tracked more than 3,600 deaths in an interactive database and published
hundreds of in-depth profiles of those lost on the frontlines, the
nation’s most-complete accounting of the pandemic’s toll on health care
workers. The profiles not only feature doctors, nurses and other medical
professions, but also others working at hospitals, nursing homes and
other medical facilities, including aides, administrative employees, and
cleaning and maintenance staff.
As
the project evolved, the team of journalists published multiple
investigative stories examining why workers died and assembled a clearer
picture of who was hit hardest: Workers of color, younger staffers, and
low-paid employees with extensive patient contact working in the shadows
of American health care.
“The
government wasn’t counting or investigating health care worker deaths, so
journalists filled the void,” said Elisabeth Rosenthal, KHN’s
editor-in-chief. “As a result, readers and families of the victims have a
memorial to those lost. Equally important, we pursued accountability from
all the institutions that failed to protect the safety of these workers,
who were forced to put their lives on the line.”
“These
workers fought the hardest and the longest on behalf of others over the
last year. ‘Lost on the Frontline’ was the most expansive piece of
journalism the Guardian undertook in 2020 and hopefully it will serve as
a historical record that marks their service and remembers their lives,”
said John Mulholland, editor of Guardian US.
About KFF and KHN
KHN
(Kaiser Health News) is a national newsroom that produces in-depth
journalism about health issues. Together with Policy Analysis and
Polling, KHN is one of the three major operating programs at KFF
(Kaiser Family Foundation). KFF is an endowed nonprofit organization
providing information on health issues to the nation.
About Guardian News
& Media
Guardian US
is renowned for its Pulitzer Prize-winning investigation into widespread
secret surveillance by the National Security Agency, and for other
award-winning work, including The Paradise Papers. Guardian US has
bureaus in New York, Washington, New Orleans and Oakland, California,
covering the climate crisis, politics, race and immigration, gender, national
security and more.
Guardian News &
Media (GNM), publisher of theguardian.com, is one of the largest
English-speaking newspaper websites in the world. Since launching its
U.S. and Australian digital editions in 2011 and 2013, respectively,
traffic from outside of the U.K. now represents over two-thirds of The
Guardian’s total digital audience.
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