'NY Times' Reporters Win Grand Prize in RFK Awards

By: E&P Staff A New York Times report about "Diseases on the Brink" was named grand-prize winner of the 39th Annual Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Awards.

The report -- which won the RFK contest's international print category -- was by Donald McNeil, Jr., and Celia W. Dugger of the Times. It spotlighted how millions of the world's poorest people are still endangered by diseases that could be inexpensively cured or prevented.

RFK judge Tom Kennedy of Washington Post/Newsweek Interactive said the Times journalists combined "statistical research and interviews with public health experts, local volunteers, aid donors, scientists, and community leaders with directly-observed heartbreaking anecdotes about the lives of those impacted by diseases such as polio, measles, guinea worms, lymphatic filariasis, trachoma, as well as iodine deficiencies."

Among the other RFK winners:

-- Domestic Print: George Pawlaczyk and Beth Hundsdorfer of the Belleville (Ill.) News-Democrat for "Lethal Lapses"

-- Domestic Photography: Matt Black of the Los Angeles Times for "From Dust to Dust"

-- International Photography: Mike Stocker and Joe Amon of Fort Lauderdale's South Florida Sun Sentinel for "AIDS Orphans"

-- Editorial Cartooning: Clay Bennett of The Christian Science Monitor and The Christian Science Monitor News Service

-- College Print: Ruth Bradley of Texas Tech University's Daily Toreador for "Lubbock in the Dark"

Winners will be honored in a May 23 ceremony in Washington, D.C.