Press Release

Contact:
Kate Ruddon
404-653-0790
kruddon@cdc.gov

CDC Foundation Announces 2003 Class of Knight Journalism Fellows at CDC

April 15, 2003, ATLANTA - Eight experienced health/science journalists have been chosen to study epidemiology and public health this summer at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Recipients of the Knight Public Health Journalism Fellowships at CDC for 2003 are:

  • Golda Armah, health reporter for the Daily Graphic in Accra, Ghana
  • Kim Frick, European health reporter for the Bloomberg wire service in Zurich, Switzerland
  • Caleb Hellerman, a writer for ABC’s “Good Morning America”
  • Cynthia Mills, a free-lance writer and practicing veterinarian in Portland, OR
  • Naftali Mungai, a sub-editor for science and health at The People Daily in Nairobi, Kenya
  • Julie Piotrowski, public health reporter for Modern Healthcare
  • Ann Potempa, health reporter at the Anchorage Daily News
  • David Tuller, a free-lance writer in San Francisco specializing in health issues

The Knight Fellows will begin their studies June 16 with an intensive 10-day “Boot Camp” in public health journalism, which will also be attended by approximately two-dozen other journalists. At the end of the course, the fellows begin advanced studies in biostatistics and epidemiology, training side-by-side with members of the Epidemic Intelligence Service, CDC’s “disease detectives.” Fellows will accompany these specialists on outbreak investigations and conduct disease surveillance in the field. While at CDC, the fellows work on special projects with scientists and other mentors of their choice.

This will be the fourth class of fellows to go through the Fellowship program, and the second time that the Knight program at CDC will host the Boot Camp.

Both programs have been made possible through a grant to the CDC Foundation from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation in Miami. The purpose of the programs is to encourage better reporting on public health issues.

2003 CDC Knight Journalism Fellows

Golda Armah
Golda Armah is a senior health reporter with the Daily Graphic, a national newspaper in Ghana, and a contributor to Africawoman, a Web-based publication by African women journalists. She serves on a coalition of non-governmental organizations that promotes women’s rights in Ghana and is secretary of the Health Communications Institute, a Danish-sponsored forum that brings doctors, scientists and journalists together to discuss accurate reporting of public health issues. Ms. Armah is a graduate of the Ghana Institute of Journalism, where she also holds a diploma in population communication.
Kim Frick
Kim Frick covers the business and science of health for Bloomberg News, a global newswire. A U.S. citizen who is fluent in German, she is based in Zurich, Switzerland, where she covers the European pharmaceutical industry and various public health issues, such as AIDS. Ms. Frick has worked as a journalist for 13 years; before becoming a health reporter, she covered a wide range of issues and won an award for coverage of the Los Angeles riots. In 1995, she was an Arthur Burns Fellow in Germany (a two-month exchange program for journalists), and in December 2001 she attended a week-long “Genes and Cells” workshop at MIT. Ms. Frick has a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of California at Long Beach.
Caleb Hellerman
Since 1997, Caleb Hellerman has been a writer for ABC-TV, first for “World News Tonight” and then for “Good Morning America,” covering breaking news of all varieties. Mr. Hellerman was also a writer and producer for CNN from 1993 to 1997. In his spare time, he has written for a number of publications and is a contributing editor for the Web site inequality.org, which explores health disparities caused by economic inequality. Mr. Hellerman graduated from Columbia University in 1992 with a bachelor’s degree in American history, and studied both Spanish and French at the advanced level in college.
Cynthia Mills
A veterinarian, Cynthia Mills practices part-time in emergency clinics to supplement her income as a free-lance journalist. She is author of a book that will be published in the fall, entitled The Theory of Evolution: What It Is, Where It Came From, and Why It Works. She is planning a second book on the growing interaction of wildlife and humans and its likely effects on disease development. Ms. Mills has written about rabies, ticks, captive breeding of endangered species and wildlife plagues. After earning a degree in economics, she received a D.V.M. in 1982 from the University of California-Davis. She practiced small-animal medicine until 1990, when she was hired by a pharmaceutical company to design and conduct a clinical trial in animals. She studied science communication at the University of California-Santa Cruz in 1993.
Naftali Mungai
Naftali Mungai is writer and sub-editor for science and health for The People Daily in Nairobi, Kenya. In his spare time, he is a correspondent for Biosafety News, a monthly Kenyan paper covering biotechnology, health, agriculture and environment, and a correspondent for the U.S.-based Environment News Service (ENS) Web site. Mr. Mungai has a bachelor’s degree in biology from the University of Nairobi and a master’s degree in medical parasitology from the London School of Hygiene, in addition to a post-graduate diploma in mass communication from the University of Nairobi. Before turning to journalism, Mr. Mungai worked at the Kenya Trypanosome Research Institute for 15 years, specializing in research on Tsetse flies.
Julie Piotrowski
Based in New York City, Julie Piotrowski is the public health reporter for Modern Healthcare magazine, the health care business news weekly serving the nation’s hospitals. She has spent much of her time recently chronicling the federal vaccination program for smallpox. In addition to public health, she also covers public, rural and specialty hospitals and post-acute care. Ms. Piotrowski, who speaks French, holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University, with a specialty minor in science and human culture. When the World Trade Center collapsed, she worked with the Red Cross for three months at Ground Zero and now is in training as a member of the agency’s disaster-response team.
Ann Potempa
For three years, Ann Potempa has been the health reporter for the Anchorage Daily News in Alaska. She has become intrigued by cultural practices that have health consequences among native populations. Before moving to Alaska, Ms. Potempa covered other subjects, including the 2002 Olympics, for the Provo (Utah) Daily Herald. She completed a double major in print journalism and sociology from the University of Wisconsin - Madison in 1997. Recently Ms. Potempa won the President’s Award from the McClatchy Newspapers for an article on teenage suicide.
David Tuller
David Tuller, a free-lance journalist in San Francisco, is a regular contributor to ScienceTimes, the health and science section of The New York Times, as well as Salon.com and other publications. He worked for eight years at the San Francisco Chronicle, where he covered HIV/AIDS, health insurance, occupational health and gay/lesbian issues, among other beats. His other interests include international health issues, infectious diseases, reproductive health, environmental health, mental health and bioterrorism. Mr. Tuller lived in Russia for two years during which time he participated in a nine-month Knight International Press Fellowship. He still returns to Russia and the former Soviet republics a few times a year to conduct journalism seminars for students and young reporters. Mr. Tuller graduated from Harvard College in 1978 with a degree in English literature, and speaks Russian and French.