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    Healthcare Is Scary. Channel Your Fears Into a Haiku.

    everyonehub2025@gmail.comBy 3 Comments2 Mins Read1 Views
    Healthcare Is Scary. Channel Your Fears Into a Haiku.

    Something wicked this way comes, and it’s 5-7-5.

    Our annual Halloween haiku contest is back, and we’re once again summoning readers to turn the horrors of healthcare into three tiny lines of poetry. Surprise us with a verse about medical bills, insurance, hospitals, health policy, or whatever else keeps you up at night. 

    Whether you’re inspired by a botched surgery, a ghastly charge, or insurance-induced existential dread, we want to read about it. 

    Our newsroom’s panel of judges will choose their favorites, which we’ll share on our social channels. Winning haikus will be announced on Friday, Oct. 30. 

    • Submit your haiku to https://kffhealthnews.org/contact-haiku/, along with the link to the related KFF Health News article.
    • “Like” KFF Health News on Facebook, and follow @KFFHealthNews on X, @kffhealthnews.org on Bluesky, and @kffhealthnews on Instagram.
    • (Optional) Include your X, Bluesky, or Instagram handle in the submission and let us know if it’s OK to give you a shoutout on social media.
    • Submit your haiku by the witching hour, 11:59 p.m. ET, on Monday, Oct. 19.
    • To win, the haiku should meet the following criteria:

    🎃 Follow the format of a haiku (a three-line poem with 17 syllables, written in a 5/7/5-syllable count).

    🎃 Contain information related to healthcare and/or health policy that follows the scary/Halloween theme.

    🎃 Reference a KFF Health News story in the haiku — as a bonus.

    🎃 No use of artificial intelligence is allowed. Entries created or modified by AI will not be considered.

    Submissions may be lightly edited for style and clarity before publication.

    The top three haikus will rise again with a custom comic illustration drawn by staff illustrator Oona Zenda. The grand-prize-winning haiku will be featured in the KFF Health News Morning Briefing on Friday, Oct. 30, and we will give the author a shoutout — or hair-raising scream — on our social media pages, using the hashtag #HealthcareScare.

    2025 Halloween Haiku Contest Winners

    2024 Halloween Haiku Contest Winners

    2023 Halloween Haiku Contest Winners

    2022 Halloween Haiku Contest Winners

    A black and white cartoon drawing of a witch lying on her back looking at her phone with a frightened expression. A black cat stands on her stomach and paws at the window, where viruses and bacteria are floating menacingly outside. At the bottom of the drawing, a haiku reads: "Covid, Ebola, / Monkeypox, seasonal flu – / Who needs Halloween?"
    (Illustration: Oona Zenda/KFF Health News; Haiku: Paul Hughes-Cromwick)
    A black and white cartoon ink drawing shows two skeletons in a mirrored position looking at each other. One is a real skeleton while the other is a human in a costume. They are thinking. A spider holding a face mask is hanging between them. Below the drawing, a haiku reads: "Ghastly, grotesque, sick! / You mask up to trick-or-treat, / But not for covid?"
    (Illustration: Oona Zenda/KFF Health News; Haiku: Micki Jackson)
    A black and white cartoon drawing shoes a headless horseman holding surprise medical bills while yelling, "surpriiiiiise!" Below him, a haiku reads: "Surprise billing curbs, / Like the famed headless horseman, / Remain incomplete."
    (Illustration: Oona Zenda/KFF Health News; Haiku: Michael L. Millenson)

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