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Whether due to obesity, diabetes, smoking, a lack of access to health care or mistakes at hospitals, mothers in South Dakota and the United States have far higher rates of death and complications due to childbirth than most industrialized countries, such as Canada and the U.K. Now, a new effort is underway in South Dakota to better understand the causes and to curtail a type of death seen as mostly preventable.

Overall enrollment is down about 5% since 2010 at the six public universities in South Dakota, reducing revenues along the way. As a result, universities are changing the way they do business, but part of those changes may be a belt-tightening that could affect faculty positions and offerings to students.

Gov. Kristi Noem has proposed a series of reforms to increase and improve state oversight of privately run youth treatment homes, including hiring of more inspectors and requiring the first-ever unannounced inspections. Noem's recommendations came after a South Dakota News Watch investigation into abuse of residents and lax state oversight of the Aurora Plains Academy youth home in Plankinton, S.D.

Overall retail sales have climbed steadily in South Dakota in recent years, but who is getting the revenue, and how, is changing. As online retail continues to surge, chain stores grow in number and low-priced dollar stores arrive in small towns in droves, maintaining a successful brick-and-mortar small retail business continues to be a challenge.

Whether it is hogs, cattle, chickens or turkeys, South Dakota farmers who operate concentrated animal feeding operations take pride in their work and feel good about the foods they produce. In this article, part of a two-week special report on the growth of concentrated animal feeding operations, South Dakota News Watch reporter Bart Pfankuch takes readers behind the barn walls for a tour of three South Dakota livestock operations and provides insight into the farmers who are part of a trend of expansion of large livestock farms.

Officials, including governor, say tax rebate program can encourage new economic development and add value to existing farms. But opponents say program unfairly pushes counties to approve large livestock projects.

As the majority of livestock production in America has moved to concentrated animal feeding operations, new and expanding research has increasingly shown a correlation to the farms and human health problems, environmental issues and possibly the rise of antibiotic-resistance illnesses.

PART 1 OF A 2-WEEK SERIES: South Dakota livestock production is undergoing a major transition with the expansion of concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs, in which thousands and even millions of animals are raised in a confined space. The large livestock operations are efficient and profitable, but they can also harm human health and damage the environment. As opposition rises, state government is offering financial incentives to counties that approve new projects. Along the way, the farms are sowing heated division in many rural communities and stoking fears South Dakota may end up like CAFO-heavy Iowa, which has seen fish kills and waterway pollution. THIS WEEK: Overview of CAFO growth in S.D.; Health concerns follow CAFOs; New state program provides financial incentives for CAFOs. NEXT WEEK: A visit to three large S.D. livestock operations

Residents in wide swaths of rural South Dakota do not have access to primary medical care, let alone specialist care. Medical schools, including the University of South Dakota, are graduating more doctors than ever, but those young doctors do not have enough residency opportunities to complete their training to work on their own. The problem has heightened barriers to access to health care in rural areas of the state.

Content Director Bart Pfankuch discusses some of the challenges of producing in-depth articles about significant statewide topics.