Lead FDA vaccine regulator announced new approval process after claiming Covid vaccine had killed 10 children
The leading vaccine regulator at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has announced a far stricter course for federal vaccine approvals, following claims from his team that Covid vaccines were linked to the deaths of at least 10 children.
Experts suggest the announcement will make the vaccine approval process significantly more difficult.
Continue reading...Sorfequiline shows stronger action than existing treatments against illness that killed 1.23 million last year
A new treatment for tuberculosis could boost cure rates and shorten the time needed to treat the disease by months, trial results suggest.
Globally, an estimated 10.7 million people fell ill with TB last year and 1.23 million died from it.
Continue reading...Draft template seen by the Guardian has no reference to countries receiving benefits for sharing information, such as guaranteed access to medicines developed as a result
The US wants countries to agree to hand over information on bugs that could cause large-scale disease outbreaks in return for restoring aid to tackle health problems such as HIV and malaria, according to government documents.
The Trump administration is seeking new bilateral aid agreements with dozens of countries, after an abrupt withdrawal from existing arrangements at the start of this year. The agreements form part of a new America First Global Health Strategy announced in September.
Continue reading...UK expected to reduce contribution to Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria by 20%
A group of seven Labour MPs who served as ministers under Keir Starmer have written to the prime minister warning that an expected cut to UK funding for aid to combat preventable diseases would be both a “moral failure” and a strategic disaster.
With ministers and officials expected to decide the UK’s contribution to the Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria within days, the letter renews pressure on Starmer to pull back from an expected 20% cut.
Continue reading...Analysis of DNA from teeth of troops buried in mass grave suggests soldiers had paratyphoid fever and relapsing fever
When Napoleon ordered his army to retreat from Russia in October 1812, disaster ensued. Starving, cold, exhausted and struggling with sickness, an estimated 300,000 soldiers died.
Researchers now say they have identified two unexpected diseases among soldiers who died in the retreat – paratyphoid fever and relapsing fever – which provide fresh insights into their plight.
Continue reading...Expected reduction in contributions by wealthy countries likely to cost millions of lives and billions in lost growth
Slashed contributions from wealthy countries to an anti-malaria fund could allow a resurgence of the disease, costing millions of lives and billions of pounds by the end of the decade, according to a new analysis.
The fight against malaria faces new threats, including extreme weather and humanitarian crises increasing the number of people exposed, and growing biological resistance to insecticides and drugs, the report warns.
Continue reading...The disease was eliminated across the Americas in 2024, but urgent vaccination drives are now under way as cases rise from Mexico to Bolivia after outbreaks farther north
Governments across Latin America are stepping up efforts to vaccinate their populations against measles, as outbreaks in North America drive a 34-fold increase in the number of cases reported in the region this year.
Measles cases have surged worldwide to a 25-year high, due to low vaccine coverage and the spread of misinformation about vaccine safety. However, there is added concern in parts of Latin America over unequal access to healthcare and the worrying situation in the US, which is facing its worst measles outbreak in decades following a reversal of vaccine policy led by Donald Trump’s health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr.
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Parents need boost to lift flagging vaccination rate
Parents need practical strategies such as easier access to appointments and bulk-billing to help reverse a concerning decline in childhood vaccination rates, research has found.
The top barriers were mostly around ability to get appointments easily, being able to prioritise their child’s vaccination over all of the other things that they have to get done, the cost of getting their child vaccinated.
We now know that that will be on the 20th of October. The point here is that they had spoken a number of times by phone. The relationship is conducted at many, many levels. It is going well.
We’ve got the lowest tariff rate. Aukus is happening at a pace. And so we’re really confident … about the progress of our relationship with the US.
Continue reading...Local hospital’s cooling tower was found to be harboring the bacteria after seven people died and 90 were hospitalized over three weeks
New York City has declared the deadly legionnaires’ disease outbreak in central Harlem over, nearly three weeks since it began.
On Friday, city health officials announced that there have been no new cases among residents who live or work in the area since 9 August. As of Friday, there have been 114 cases of legionnaires’ disease, with 90 people hospitalized – six of those remaining in hospital – and seven deaths.
Continue reading...Gains in cutting deaths from tuberculosis at risk as health officials warn clinics forced to ration drugs and testing
Malawi is facing a critical shortage of tuberculosis drugs, with health officials warning that stocks will run out by the end of September.
It comes just months after the World Health Organization (WHO) revealed that the country had successfully reduced tuberculosis (TB) cases by 40% over the past decade.
Continue reading...MSF charity calls situation ‘beyond urgent’ as thousands seeking refuge from war rely on contaminated water
The “worst cholera outbreak in years” has killed at least 40 people in the last week in Sudan, according to the medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières.
Overwhelmed medical centres are resorting to treating patients on mattresses on the floor, MSF said, as the country’s two-year civil war aids the spread of the disease.
Continue reading...Samoa, Fiji and Tonga among the worst affected amid warning the disease and others will become ‘more common and more serious’ as the planet warms
The climate crisis is driving a sharp rise in dengue fever cases across the Pacific islands, experts say, as infections hit their highest level in a decade and several countries declare emergencies.
Pacific Island countries and territories have reported 16,502 confirmed cases and 17 deaths since the start of 2025, according to the Pacific Syndromic Surveillance System (PSSS), which collaborates with the World Health Organization (WHO) and other agencies. Infections across the region are at the highest level since 2016, the WHO said. Fiji, Samoa and Tonga are among the worst affected.
Continue reading...The country, beset by war, has the world’s lowest rates of vaccination, says the World Health Organization, as global immunisation drive also stalls
Children in Sudan, caught up in what aid organisations have called the world’s largest humanitarian crisis and threatened by rising levels of violence, are increasingly vulnerable to deadly infectious diseases as vaccinations in the country plummet.
In 2022, more than 90% of young children in Sudan received their routine vaccinations. But that figure has nearly halved to 48%, the lowest in the world, according to the World Health Organization.
Continue reading...Michael Kirk Moore accused of distributing at least 1,937 false vaccination cards and administering saline to children
The US Department of Justice dropped charges on Saturday against Michael Kirk Moore, the Utah doctor accused of destroying more than $28,000 worth of government-provided Covid-19 vaccines and administering saline to children instead of the shot.
Pam Bondi, the US attorney general, announced the news in a statement on the social media platform X, saying the charges had been dismissed under her direction.
Continue reading...Curbs on LGBTQ+ rights and a halt to US funding may reverse decades of progress in fight to end Aids epidemic, warns UNAids
People at higher risk of HIV, such as gay men and people who inject drugs, are facing record levels of criminalisation worldwide, according to UNAids.
For the first time since the joint UN programme on HIV/Aids began reporting on punitive laws a decade ago, the number of countries criminalising same-sex sexual activity and gender expression has increased.
Continue reading...European Commission unveils strategy for storing food, medicine, generators and raw materials
The EU should develop stockpiles of food, medicine, generators and raw materials to be better prepared for a military invasion, pandemic or natural disaster, the European Commission has said.
Outlining its first-ever strategy on stockpiling, the EU executive said on Wednesday member states should also consider emergency supplies of water purification products, equipment to repair undersea cables, drones and mobile bridges for use in conflicts.
Continue reading...Medicine shortages plus limited testing and hospital capacity exacerbated by withdrawal of USAID as outbreak gathers pace across countries in the region
Malawi’s ministry of health has announced three new cases of mpox in the capital, Lilongwe, bringing the number of confirmed cases to 11 since the country’s first was reported in April.
Malawi is one of 16 countries in Africa reporting mpox outbreaks as health officials battle with vaccine shortages as well as limited testing and hospital capacity.
Continue reading...Cases in New Mexico and Kansas give experts reason to be ‘concerned’ in second-worst US measles year since 2000
The measles outbreak in Texas is showing signs of slowing, though other states are seeing more cases and health officials are warning against complacency as the US continues to experience high rates of measles amid falling vaccination rates.
It has been a handful of days since anyone in Lubbock, Texas, has tested positive, and there are no known measles hospitalizations at the children’s hospital in the city, which has also cared for children from nearby Gaines county.
Continue reading...Cases in New Mexico and Kansas give experts reason to be ‘concerned’ in second-worst US measles year since 2000
The measles outbreak in Texas is showing signs of slowing, though other states are seeing more cases and health officials are warning against complacency as the US continues to experience high rates of measles amid falling vaccination rates.
It has been a handful of days since anyone in Lubbock, Texas, has tested positive, and there are no known measles hospitalizations at the children’s hospital in the city, which has also cared for children from nearby Gaines county.
Continue reading...But older children, who had no access to the shots, had higher rates this winter compared with last
New vaccines and treatments are linked to a dramatic decline in RSV hospitalizations for babies, according to a new study from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
This past winter was the first RSV season with widespread availability of a vaccine given during pregnancy and a monoclonal antibody treatment given in the first eight months of life to prevent RSV (respiratory syncytial virus).
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