Rosemary Westwood is a leading reporter on abortion and reproductive health in the U.S., specializing in the Deep South, and a regular contributor on abortion and reproductive health to NPR. Rosemary is also the reporter, creator and host of Banned, the award-winning, hit podcast that tells the story of the Mississippi case that overturned Roe v. Wade, a #7 Apple news podcast downloaded over 320,000 times and featured in New York Magazine. She’s worked for the top media outlets in three countries over her 16-year career as a journalist, writer and editor. Canadian-born and New Orleans-based, her work focuses on politics, gender and reproductive rights. She’s a member of NPR’s health and religion collaboratives; she was part of NPR’s live Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization Supreme Court coverage and published some of the first reporting on the impact of state abortion bans. Her work has been quoted in numerous Supreme Court briefs and research papers, featured on MSNBC and CBS’s 60 Minutes, and she’s been interviewed on Up First, Morning Edition, All Things Considered, Think, 1A, leading Canadian news podcasts and international TV. Beginning in 2020, she has reported on public and reproductive health and edited features and podcasts for WWNO and WRKF, NPR affiliates in Louisiana.
Since moving to New Orleans in 2016, Rosemary’s work has appeared in NPR, KFF Health News, Oxford American, Pacific Standard, Guardian US, Elle, Marie Claire, Vice, Vox, The Walrus, The Toronto Star, The Globe and Mail, Maclean’s, CBC News, Refinery29 and others. She’s won a prestigious 2023 National Edward R. Murrow Award and multiple regional awards, and a 2022 Award for Excellence in Health Care Journalism. Her work has been funded by the International Women’s Media Foundation, the Economic Hardship Reporting Project and the Packard Foundation. Before moving to the US, she was a national columnist, podcast host and magazine writer in Canada. Prior to that, she produced world news for BBC radio programs in London, UK. And prior to that, she worked in local newsrooms across the Canadian West, memorably covering the day a Grizzly bear walked through downtown Squamish B.C. Rosemary got her start in journalism at her university newspaper. She holds a BA in creative writing from the University of Victoria, where she studied fiction and creative nonfiction writing. She loves running along the Mississippi River and reading (lately Claire Keegan). Rosemary lives in New Orleans with her husband and two young sons.