The Cancer Letter staff were finalists for nine 2025 Dateline Awards from the Washington, D.C. Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists—seven for journalism; two for design—and won first place for four.
The Cancer Letter’s entries recognized by SPJ include investigative journalism, series, breaking news, features, photojournalism, commentary, illustration, and front page design. This is the eighth consecutive year The Cancer Letter has won first-place awards for illustration.
Jacquelyn Cobb, associate editor of The Cancer Letter, followed a year-long story on multi-cancer early detection tests, earning a first-place award for investigative journalism.
MCDs are on the market, and the hype surrounding them is nearly endless. Jacquelyn’s investigative series reveals how these tests made their developers a lot of money, while falling short of their promises.
The argument for utilization of MCDs seemed logical: If screening can be much more accessible (by a simple blood test) and can catch cancer in its early stages (as MCDs promised to do), how could they be anything but a boon for oncology?
Skeptics respond with a different set of questions: Are these tests accurate? Are they useful? And how much harm can they do?
The Cancer Letter’s Claire Marie Porter won a first place award for breaking news with a series of reports tracking Hurricane Helene’s unprecedented impact on all aspects of cancer care, including a nationwide IV fluid shortage caused by destruction of bridges to Asheville’s Baxter factory.
In a first for The Cancer Letter, Paul Goldberg, editor and publisher, won a first-place award for a photography story, featuring photographs by Oleksandr Istomin, a pediatric hematologist at the Bone Marrow Transplantation and Immunotherapy Department at Kyiv’s Ohmatdyt Hospital.
On Monday, July 8, 2024, Istomin narrowly escaped injury in a missile attack. At about 10:45 A.M., he was rifling through patient files when he heard an impact. He dropped to the floor. This—and good luck—likely saved his life.
A Russian cruise missile had struck a hospital building across the street which housed Ohmatdyt’s toxicology, dialysis, and intensive care units. The impact had caused an enormous plate glass window to fall just shy of Istomin’s head.
Istomin took out his cell phone and started to document the damage around him, walking the halls of his department, filming out of broken windows, checking in on his patients: children receiving bone marrow transplants.
“We have immunosuppressed patients who cannot be moved to bomb shelters,” Istomin said to The Cancer Letter. “When air raid alarms sound, we tell them to go out into the corridors or stay in your rooms.”
These photographs and videos, which show the extraordinary point of view of the impact of war on health care, were sent straight to The Cancer Letter, and his story is told in a play-by-play, documenting Istomin’s experience as it happened.
Journalism awards:
- Investigative Journalism, Newsletter/Trade Publications, first place: Jacquelyn Cobb, “Multi-cancer detection tests fall short of their promises”
- Breaking News, Newsletter/Trade Publications, first place: Claire Marie Porter, “Climate change exacerbates cancer disparities”
- Breaking News, Newsletter/Trade Publications, finalist: Paul Goldberg, “Leadership turnover at the American Cancer Society”
- Photography Story, Newsletter/Trade Publications, first place: Paul Goldberg, “A view from the BMT unit on the day a Russian cruise missile hit Kyiv’s Ohmatdyt hospital”
- Series, Newsletter/Trade Publications, finalist: Jacquelyn Cobb, “Impact factor mania and publish-or-perish may have contributed to Dana-Farber retractions, experts say” (The Cancer Letter, Jan. 26, Feb. 2, 2024)
- Features, Newsletter/Trade Publications, finalist: Alexandria Carolan, “An oncologist navigates terminal sarcoma, insurmountable debt, and ‘a legacy of grief’”
- Commentary & Criticism, Newsletter/Trade Publications, finalist: Paul Goldberg, “As Trump’s second term nears, Republican support for NIH is at a low point”
Design awards:
- Art/Photo Illustration, Newsletter/Trade Publications, first place: Katie Goldberg, “Illustrating oncology in 2024”
- Front-Page Design, Newsletter/Trade Publications, finalist: Jacqueline Ong, Katie Goldberg, Cyrus Finegan, “Cancer research section covers”
