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North Carolina’s first standalone children’s hospital will be built in a bedroom community near the state capital, the project’s health systems announced Thursday, creating a campus estimated to bring 8,000 jobs to the area. UNC Health and Duke Health announced in January an agreement to jointly build the proposed 500-bed pediatric hospital and linked facilities in the state’s Research Triangle region, which includes Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill. (7/11)

After several ultrasounds and consultations with specialists, J made the wrenching decision to terminate her pregnancy in February 2024. To do it, she had to leave her home in eastern North Carolina and travel four hours to Richmond, Virginia. (Crumpler, 7/14)

Boxy, gunmetal gray buildings loom over a labyrinth of ducts and tubes and catwalks, beyond which 100 train cars loll on their tracks. Smokestacks wait to exhale. This is StarPet, a mammoth factory in north Asheboro that manufactures PET polymers, derived from fossil fuels and used in polyester fibers and plastic bottles. (Sorg, 7/13)

Central Texas is continuing to recover from one of the deadliest floods in the state's history, which killed more than 120 people, many of whom were children. While there is an economic toll from floods due to the damage it causes to property, commerce and transportation, there is a risk to public health as well. Although rainwater is not harmful, flooding increases the risk of injury, illness and death. Heavy rainfall can cause waterways to overflow and overwhelm sewer and septic systems, environmental health experts told ABC News. (Kekatos, 7/11)

Chemical maker DuPont has agreed to a $27 million settlement to resolve a nearly decade-long lawsuit over the contamination of an upstate New York village’s water supply. The deal was announced Wednesday by lawyers representing residents of Hoosick Falls, located northwest of Albany, just as the case was headed to trial in federal court this week. The settlement brings the total recovered in the class action suit brought in 2016 to more than $90 million, lawyers for Rochester-based firm Faraci Lange said. (7/11)

A hyperbaric chamber caught fire in Arizona, leading to the gruesome death of a 43-year-old man inside the highly pressurized, oxygen-filled compartment, authorities said Thursday. Police officers and firefighters in the resort community of Lake Havasu City rushed to the 1800 block of Mesquite Avenue at about 10:50 p.m. MST on Wednesday answering calls for a "reported medical emergency for a burn patient," city officials said. (Li, 7/11)

Anne Arundel County could get an eating disorder treatment facility as a county council bill aims to spell out how the potential facility fits into zoning regulations and what its purpose within the county would be. (Matheson, 7/14)