August 30, 2024 - PBS News Hour full episode

The World Health Organization, working with other UN agencies and the Palestinian Ministry of Health, will begin vaccinating children in Gaza against polio. Israel and Hamas have agreed to have three-day pauses in fighting so health workers can distribute the vaccine. It comes amid the massive destruction of Gaza's healthcare infrastructure. Geoff Bennett discussed more with Dr. Tammy Abughnaim.

To discuss how the Taliban regime has impacted education, Amna Nawaz spoke with Afghan education activist Pashtana Durrani. She is the founder of Learn Afghanistan, a grassroots group working to expand education access there. Durrani is currently a visiting fellow at Wellesley College’s Centers for Women.

More than one in five adults in the U.S. live with a mental illness, but only about half receive treatment. Many struggle to find a therapist that will accept their insurance. An NPR/ProPublica investigation found that therapists, psychologists and psychiatrists who join insurance networks often leave because of challenges. Stephanie Sy discussed more with Annie Waldman of ProPublica.

Since its founding in 2010, the Afghanistan National Institute of Music has provided unique music training to Afghan children. In 2013, the group made a triumphant visit to the U.S. This month, three years after the Taliban retook control of Afghanistan, they returned amid a changed world. Jeffrey Brown reports for our arts and culture series, CANVAS. For more information visit anim-music.org.

In our news wrap Friday, Kamala Harris fended off challenges to her policy positions in her first interview as the Democratic nominee, Donald Trump spoke to the right-wing Moms for Liberty group in Washington, a Russian guided bomb attack on Ukraine's second-largest city killed at least five and Israel said it killed a top commander and two associates during raids in the occupied West Bank.

This week marks three years since the chaotic withdrawal of U.S. and NATO allies from Afghanistan. It also marks three years of intensifying repression of women under the Taliban regime in what the UN has described as a "striking erasure of women from public life." Producer Zeba Warsi spoke to Afghan women inside the country about their lives today. Amna Nawaz reports.

New York Times columnist David Brooks and Boston Globe columnist Kimberly Atkins Stohr join Geoff Bennett to discuss the week in politics, including former President Trump tries to change the narrative on abortion access, Vice President Harris sits down for her first interview since launching her presidential campaign and the Trump's campaign's altercation at Arlington National Cemetery.