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West Nile virus has hit Louisiana hard this summer. Nearly 90 people there have contracted the mosquito-borne fever, and seven are dead. It's the largest outbreak in the United States yet, and with three more months of warm weather ahead, local health officials fear it will only get worse. NPR's John Nielsen reports for All Things Considered.

A recently released study in the United Kingdom reveals a dramatic increase in the use of pop songs at funerals. Sweeping ballads like Wing Beneath My Wings and My Heart Will Go On seem to be overtaking traditional hymns as suitable send-offs for the departed. Host Liane Hansen speaks with Lorinda Sheasby, marketing manager of FuneralCare.

He was one of the big hitmakers of the 60's with such songs as Devil or Angel, Take Good Care of my Baby, The Night has a Thousand Eyes, Rubber Ball, Run to Him, and Come Back When You Grow Up. He got his start at the age of 15 when his band filled in for Buddy Holly at the concert Holly failed to appear at because of his death in a plane crash. Vee released a tribute recording to Holly in 1999.

He won a Pulitzer Prize for his novel Empire Falls which was also a national bestseller. His subject matter is working-class unpretentious people, but as one reviewer writes he transforms 'every day people and seemingly ordinary events - into the quintessential'. Hes written five novels in all, including Mohawk, The Risk Pool, and Nobodys Fool (which was made into a film starring Paul Newman). His latest book is a collection of stories, The Whores Child and Other Stories. (Knopf).

Host Liane Hansen talks with Rachel Swarns of The New York Times about this week's World Summit on Sustainable Development, held in Johannesburg, South Africa. Organizers say the talks will center on practical solutions to the problems of the developing world.

In a series of reports for Morning Edition, NPR Beijing correspondent Rob Gifford profiles five people from across China who symbolize the massive changes the country is undergoing as it makes its transition away from communism. The latest segment features Wu Dongmei, a young woman who, in search of a better life, migrated 1,000 miles from her village to work at a clothing factory.

The Smithsonian National Museum of American History opened a new exhibit Monday featuring the Cambridge, Mass. kitchen where Julia Child filmed many of her television shows -- and where many Americans learned to be less afraid of French cooking. See photos and a video of the exhibit -- and learn about Child's life as a World War II spy. See http://americanhistory.si.edu/kitchen/index.htm.

Writer Joelle Fraser. She's written a new memoir about growing up in mid-60s San Francisco, the daughter of a flower child and a surfer: The Territory of Men.

Since the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act, more students with serious mental illnesses have been attending college. Madge Kaplan of member station WGBH in Boston reports on how colleges, and students with mental illness, are coping with the change.

This week the Sunken Garden Poetry Festival features high school contributors. Jennifer Steele and Laura Mandelberg are two of the writers featured in the 10th annual Young Poets Competition, co-sponsored by the festival. They read from their poems for Weekend Edition.