Meet The Examination, a nonprofit watchdog for global health

Throughout his career, investigative journalist Ben Hallman has chased stories with “huge consequences, but insufficient attention.”

So when The Lancet reported in April 2023 that just four industries — tobacco, unhealthy food, fossil fuels and alcohol — are responsible for at least a third of global deaths each year, something clicked.

Nineteen million lives lost annually is a staggering consequence. And yet, Hallman saw that the media mostly looked away.

News outlets, he said, are drawn to “death that happens quickly and spectacularly,” not the slow, grinding harm shaped by people’s environments — or by the corporations profiting from them.

“All of that just doesn’t really get reported on with anywhere near the frequency and depth that it deserves based on the human toll,” he said.

So he set out to change that.

Based on his experience in nonprofit and investigative newsrooms — including roles as deputy editor at The Trace, which covers gun violence, and a senior editor at the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists — he envisioned a new newsroom that would combine a single-issue focus with cross-border techniques. He pitched the idea. Bloomberg Philanthropies backed it.

“Our backers agreed that, yes, in fact, this is a huge gap and that journalism can help fill it,” he said.

The Examination launched on Sept. 13, 2023, with three stories — one for each of its three beats: tobacco, Big Food and pollution. (It has since added drugs as a fourth coverage area.)

Its tagline reads: “Fearless journalism for a healthier world.”

By February 2023, Hallman had recruited his first two team members: Asraa Mustufa and Will Fitzgibbon, both former colleagues from ICIJ.

Fitzgibbon came on as a senior reporter and global partnership coordinator. Mustufa, now managing editor, was immediately drawn to the mission.

“I really liked what Ben was proposing, which was pointing out the corporate actors that have a disproportionate impact, and looking at it more systemically,” she said. “Who’s responsible, naming names, identifying specific practices or behaviors — that just felt like a new way into health reporting.”

Her first task was managing the development of The Examination’s website to best reflect the organization’s mission. A partnership with design firm GladEye brought that to life.

On the homepage, the bold title font sits stark white against a black background. Small details enhance the user experience — hovering over the words “tobacco,” “Big Food” and “pollution” adds animations to the title. Further down, other attention-grabbing tricks include blown-up statistics and dynamic, color-coded highlighting.

(Screenshot/The Examination)

“When we finally launched, people responded really well to the look and feel. … There’s a lot of news websites that look similar, and I think ours is a little more creative,” she said.

The Examination’s staff has grown to almost 20, including reporters, editors, and data and production teams. They work remotely, but they maintain “virtual touch points” and meet in person at least once a year, Mustufa said.

Reporters typically spend a few months on a single investigative project — one of the benefits of an investigative nonprofit newsroom — although they sometimes mix in quicker stories to stay current with the news cycle.

In pitches, Mustufa looks for stories that are “informative and actionable and empowering” for consumers, especially when there are “so many depressing global health threats out there.”

“What I’m always trying to keep my eye on and push the team towards is, what can we do that no one else is able or willing to do?” she said. “Because we have limited resources. So we have to really call our shots.”

Food reporter Sasha Chavkin’s first story, one of the three published on The Examination’s launch day, covered dietitian influencers paid by the American Beverage Association to promote artificial sweeteners like aspartame in contradiction to warnings from the World Health Organization. The influencers failed to clearly disclose the sponsorship to their viewers.

Chavkin’s investigation, in collaboration with The Washington Post, revealed that “among 68 dietitians with 10,000 or more social media followers on TikTok or Instagram, about half had promoted food, beverages or supplements to their combined 11 million followers within the last year.”

After the article’s publication, the Federal Trade Commission sent letters to the dietitians and the American Beverage Association ordering them to stop or face fines. Chavkin was gratified to see results so soon.

“Most dietitians are doing fantastic work that is making people healthier, but it’s actually really damaging to them, too, to have a small group of people cashing in from the food industry to put out these industry talking points, essentially,” he said.

The outcomes Chavkin observed from the dietitian story emphasized a major benefit of the food beat: People really care about it.

But food and nutrition can also be really personal. “There’s just a whole different level of sensitivity that you have to apply,” he said.

For example, another story exposed Big Food and dietitians, again, as architects behind the “anti-diet” movement. The story’s lead character was a woman who had embraced the movement and gained 50 pounds.

Chavkin and The Washington Post found that General Mills funded research about “food shaming” and “has showered giveaways on registered dietitians who promote its cereals online with the hashtag #DerailTheShame, and sponsored influencers who promote its sugary snacks.”

Partnerships brought some early wins to The Examination. For a lean nonprofit newsroom, collaborations are key to reaching wide audiences. The Examination landed big ones soon after launch: The New York Times, The Guardian and The Washington Post all ran its work.

That kind of exposure brings eyes, but not always loyalty.

“We do get a lot of questions and feedback and engagement, but sometimes it’s direct and sometimes it’s through our partners. So we’re trying to build more of our in-house audience,” she said.

Beyond prestige outlets, The Examination is also trying to move toward a “service model” of partnerships by working with local newsrooms around the world.

“We want to support health journalists out there,” Mustufa said. “Most of us are in Western countries — U.S., Canada, UK — so we can’t report on these things from a truly global perspective unless we partner with journalists from different countries.”

Chavkin agreed, warning against “parachute journalism.” Rather than flying from the U.S. to report somewhere across the world, he would rather work with a local outlet and trust their reporters, resources and on-the-ground expertise.

The “World of Pain” series, an ongoing global investigation into pharmaceutical companies that sell opioids, involves collaboration between journalists in more than 10 countries.

Going into its third year, The Examination is also growing its audience team and experimenting with alternative storytelling forms beyond its typical long-form format. Impact editor Miriam Wells focuses on designing each project for its desired impact and making sure it reaches the right stakeholders.

“I think for us, it just really boils down to making sure that the information that we’re obtaining through our reporting reaches the right audiences in the right way at the right time,” Hallman said. That might mean publishing a story in another language, sharing it on WhatsApp or discussing it with relevant political leaders.

Rather than impressing other journalists with reputed investigations, The Examination is focused on pursuing community-level impact, Hallman said.

“How is it helping the public understand a range of threats that they should better understand? How can we help policymakers and stakeholders get the information they need to help effectuate change that leads to healthier communities?”