NPR News

Air travelers, especially those on the West Coast, are facing major delays this week due to sequester-mandated employee furloughs.

As much as 10 percent of the 47,000 flight controllers and other Federal Aviation Administration workers were placed on leave Sunday, grounding a number of planes and delaying flights to and from Los Angeles, including at least six Alaska Airlines flights. 

There were conflicting reports early Wednesday afternoon about whether a suspect was or was not in custody. As of 11:15 a.m. PST, sources with knowledge of the investigation were telling NPR's Tom Gjelten that an arrest had not yet been made.

Roger Ebert, the nation's best-known film reviewer who with fellow critic Gene Siskel created the template for succinct thumbs-up or thumbs-down movie reviews, died Thursday. He was 70.

The news came just two days after Ebert announced he will be writing fewer of his famed movie reviews because of a recurrence of cancer.

The Pulitzer Prize winner announced on his blog this week that he was undergoing radiation treatment for cancer that was discovered after he fractured his hip last year, and therefore would be taking a "leave of presence."

Can’t get a straight answer on how much your medical treatment will cost? State laws may be partly to blame.

Washington state has earned an F in disclosure of health care costs, according to a new report card on price transparency. But one economist says what we don't know hasn't  — and won't — hurt us. 

Live stream videos at Ustream

By Linda Holmes / NPR

Discovery's series Frozen Planet, the latest BBC co-production in the same series as Planet Earth and Life, premieres on March 18. But they've already found the best promotional tool imaginable.

Penguins.

Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest lamented the loss of grants from the Susan G. Komen for the Cure foundation. Last year those grants amounted to of more than $75,000.

“Like so many of you, we are saddened by the Komen Foundation caving to anti-choice extremeists and letting politics interfere with health care. Local Komen affiliates provided close to $75,000 for life-saving breast cancer screenings at PPGNW health centers in WA and ID last year,” the group wrote on its Facebook page.

However, the regional Planned Parenthood group also said its breast health program would continue, “and it will be stronger than ever thanks to supporters coming forward to stand with our patients.”

The party may be over, but the trouble may just be starting in South Africa.

The health department in Free State province is recalling 1.35 million condoms that may not be up to snuff.

The affected condoms — a government brand called Choice — were distributed early this month as part of the festivities marking the 100th anniversary of the founding of the African National Congress.

Read more on Humanosphere.

For the last eight years, New York has played host to a glorious, highly-concentrated overload of improvised music called Winter Jazzfest. In recent years, the early-January festival has expanded to five nearby Greenwich Village venues, two long nights and over 4,000 attendees.

Delta blues guitarist David "Honeyboy" Edwards, one of the few living links to the mythic bluesman Robert Johnson, died on Monday at his home in Chicago, reports The New York Times. Edwards was 96.

The Regents of Washington State University have approved a sixteen percent increase in in-state undergraduate tuition on the same day that Gov. Chris Gregoire signed into law legislation giving Washington state’s four-year universities authority to set their own tuition.