Sarah Newey
Sarah Newey reports on global health security for The Telegraph, focusing on the intersection of infectious disease, development policy, rights abuses, security and conflict. Her work follows how health threats and the systems that respond to them shape the lives of people in vulnerable communities. She began working with The Telegraph in 2018 and has reported from more than 20 countries, combining field reporting with coverage of global health institutions and funding decisions. She has also taken on acting deputy editor responsibilities within the global health and security team, helping to shape wider coverage of major health challenges and responses.
Global health security and emerging pandemic risks
Newey’s core focus is the architecture of global health security and how well it protects against emerging and re-emerging diseases. She covers outbreaks and pathogen threats together with the surveillance, research and preparedness efforts designed to contain them.
In coverage of an investigation into disease “spillover” launched by The Lancet after deaths from bird flu, she reports on how infections move between animals and humans and the scientific and policy questions this raises. In a separate piece on new UK funding to address pandemic risks in Southeast Asia, she links investment decisions to known hotspots for dangerous pathogens, antimicrobial resistance and food safety concerns. She contributes to The Telegraph’s coronavirus coverage through audio formats, explaining why headline policy changes are not simple solutions and how they fit into a broader strategy against Covid.
Across these stories, she treats health security as a global system, not a single-country issue, and traces connections between local events and international preparedness debates.
Development policy, aid cuts and access to care
A second strand of Newey’s reporting examines how aid and development policy affect access to essential health services. She has covered the consequences of funding changes for HIV prevention, including reporting on a sharp fall in the use of anti-HIV pills after aid cuts and what that means for efforts to prevent infection among at-risk groups.
Her work often follows the chain from donor decisions and programme design to what frontline clinics can offer and which communities are left exposed.
Drawing on her wider interest in development policy, she looks at how health initiatives are integrated into broader efforts on poverty, governance and social protection, and highlights gaps when health commitments fail to translate into sustained services on the ground. This lens differentiates her from general health reporting by keeping the mechanics of aid, budgets and global targets in view alongside clinical outcomes.
Exploitation, trafficking and the ‘scamdemic’ economy
Newey also reports on the overlap between health, organised crime and exploitation, treating trafficking and rights abuses as critical public health concerns. In an investigation into Southeast Asia’s so-called “scamdemic”, she explores how large-scale online scamming operations are reshaping human trafficking, drawing people into forced labour and abuse within criminal compounds. That coverage tracks the psychological and physical harm faced by those trapped in these systems and the challenges for governments and international organisations attempting to respond.
By framing trafficking and exploitation through a health security lens, she connects criminal economies to disease risk, mental health and the strain on fragile health systems, rather than treating them purely as law-and-order stories.
Health systems, chronic disease and global success stories
Beyond acute outbreaks, Newey covers chronic disease and the performance of health systems, looking at how long-term conditions are managed and what can be learned from places that improve. She has interviewed public health leaders about high blood pressure, reporting on South Korea’s accomplishments in controlling hypertension and how stronger primary care and prevention can reduce the burden of cardiovascular disease.
These pieces use specific case studies to show how policy, clinical practice and population behaviour combine to produce better outcomes, and what lessons can be transferred to other settings. Her broader portfolio for specialist outlets, including work for the BMJ on tropical diseases and contributions to development-focused publications such as Devex, reinforces this attention to both clinical detail and system-level reform.
Across this strand of her work, she treats chronic disease control as integral to global health security, rather than separate from it.
4 more health journalists.
Alan Booth
Alan Booth is distinctive for linking infectious disease, laboratory research and emerging health technologies rather than treating them as separate beats. He is a senior editor at Labmate-Online, where he covers outbreaks, vaccines, drug development, antimicrobial resistance, gene therapies and laboratory innovation. His reporting has examined tuberculosis, measles, cholera, influenza and malaria, including a major tuberculosis outbreak, vaccine and drug advances, and a malaria vaccine designed to block mosquito transmission. He has also written about antibiotic-resistant bacteria, new gene therapy centres and SinS Brighton 2025. Booth reports news, research updates, interviews and event coverage for a broad laboratory audience. He presents LabMatePod, discussing AMR, emerging pathogens, public health responses and scientific history. Across articles, interviews and podcasts, he connects laboratory findings with health policy and technology using clear, well-researched science communication.
Alex Storey
Alex Storey is a journalist at LBC whose work is driven by specific cases that test professional conduct and accountability in health and the public sector. He covers health as his main beat, focusing on the point where individual decisions by clinicians or officials meet public trust in institutions. His reporting is incident-first and case-led, using concrete episodes to show how rules, ethics and policy work in real life. Recent pieces include a disciplinary case where a nurse was struck off after linking a patient’s cancer to Covid jabs, and coverage of civil servants being “paid to play Grand Theft Auto” as “lived experience” training. Across these stories, he examines how professionals, regulators and officials explain their decisions, and what that reveals about trust, responsibility and the standards expected of people in positions of authority.
Alexandra Thompson
Alexandra Thompson is an assistant news editor focused on health who treats health claims as hypotheses to be tested rather than messages to be repeated. She works at New Scientist, combining editing with frontline reporting on ageing brains, cognitive health, chronic illness, contested treatments and infectious disease. Her beat centres on how neuroscience and psychology intersect with everyday health choices and on how scientific findings translate into real-world outcomes for people living with illness. She examines lifestyle advice, rehabilitation programmes and outbreak guidance against current evidence, clarifying risk without overstating it and giving space to controversy without sensationalising it. Alongside written news she appears in audio and video formats, bringing the same clear, news-driven approach to live discussions and helping shape the daily health agenda while keeping a tight focus on evidence and impact.
Alice Wilkinson
Alice Wilkinson investigates how everyday habits, products and routines shape sleep and long-term wellbeing, using test-driven health features to separate hype from real benefit. She holds a senior role on The Telegraph’s health features team, writing and shaping consumer-focused coverage that blends personal trial with clear expert evidence. Her core beat is sleep as a practical, solvable part of daily life, from detailed comparisons of magnesium supplements to service pieces on how sleeping position affects health over time. She treats supplements as a crowded, over-claimed market that demands careful testing and clear-eyed reporting. Alongside long-form features she writes weekly health desk dispatches on sleep, stress and concentration. Across her work she combines substantial self-testing, specialist insight and plain, unfussy prose to give readers measurable, realistic changes they can make.