Audio Stories by Erin Bump

Why do Black women have disproportionately poorer brith outcomes than all other races—and how can they be improved?Produced for Century Lives: A Lifetime of Inequality from the Stanford Center on Longevity.

Do the ladies of the Quilt Guild, the short order cooks at the City Pool Hall, and “Pumpkin Joe” hold the secrets to longer life? We travel to Eastern Kentucky: a region marked by drug use, job loss, and life expectancy decline. But these folks live in Wayne County, a bright spot where life expectancy exceeds that of neighboring counties by four years. We investigate how weak ties and social cohesion improve community health.Produced for Century Lives: Place Matters from the Stanford Center on Longevity. Hosted by Ken Stern.

What could housing possibly have to do with life expectancy? Quite a bit, actually. We travel to the Bronx, the least healthy county in New York, where an affordable, working-class community called Co-op City has among the highest life expectancies in the entire city. Co-op City is also the nation’s biggest NORC, or naturally occurring retirement community. We investigate why the residents of Co-op City continue to stay there, even as they age, and meet the community's eldest resident—a supercentenarian.Produced for Century Lives: Place Matters from the Stanford Center on Longevity. Hosted by Ken Stern.

Water engineer and environmental justice advocate Siddhartha Roy was an integral part of exposing the Flint water crisis in 2015. He discusses witnessing water scarcity in his native India and his real-life fight with the Hulk.One of five interviews I produced for Century Lives: the Next 50 from the Stanford Center on Longevity. Hosted by Ken Stern.

A network of community organizations in West Oakland, CA, is using a novel approach to address an uptick in violence in its most vulnerable neighborhoods.Produced for KPFA Pacifica Radio's morning show UpFront. Edited by Lucy Kang.

Eric Brown is a marathon runner with an extraordinary goal: to run a marathon on every continent. Next up? Antarctica.This story was made in conjunction with the Salt Institute for Documentary Studies.