💉 Africa CDC plans an intervention; Meet the Asian immune atlas; A dental crisis in Africa
#559 | Climate change won't be good for Asia; Southern Africa bands together; Science: neither for me nor for thee, says the US
Hello, and welcome back to The Kable for what is unofficially the most definitive weekly round-up of all things life sciences. Editor: It’s true.
In light of recent funding cuts around the world, the Africa CDC has woken up to the fact that Africa needs a new plan A. And the agency has released a blueprint on how it aims to fill the funding gaps in trans-continental healthcare.
Elsewhere in Africa, Botswana, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe are joining forces with the WHO to make themselves ready for future health emergencies. The three-year program funded by the Pandemic Fund will be focussed on early warning and disease surveillance systems, lab networks, and public health and community staffing.
In The Kable, we have consciously not given too much coverage to recent aid and development funding cuts. We have our reasons for that, mainly to do with how imperialist colonisers should have been knocked off their perches long ago. However, this story from South Sudan where eight cholera patients died walking three hours to a clinic after aid cuts forced local health services to close deserves more worldwide attention and relentless condemnation of the shiteheads behind it.
In Nigeria, authorities are struggling to contain a meningitis outbreak which has resulted in over 150 deaths.
On World Health Day earlier this week, Afrobarometer published a survey detailing what Africans think about their government support for medical coverage. The results understandably make for dismal reading.
A for Açai. B for Brigadeiros. C for Capoeira. D for... Diabetes? Look, we're not saying Brazil is the obesity capital of South America but, hey, Novo Nordisk is putting in more than $1 billion to boost GLP-1RA drug production in the country.
Mexico has reported its first human case of H5N1 bird flu.
The new administration that is now ruling the US has never shied away from its anti-science propagation. This week, it took that a step further by refusing to share scientific data with other countries. In a new edict, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has blocked access to multiple data repositories for institutions in China, Hong Kong, Macau, Russia, Iran, North Korea, Cuba and Venezuela. The affected repositories only contain data on cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, mental health disorders, substance abuse and adolescent brain development, among others. Certainly nothing critical.
On the other side of the world, health authorities in England have reported a "surprise" case of Clade 1b mpox in a person with no reported travel history or link with previously confirmed cases in the country.
And finally, nothing new to see here.
Stories Of The Week
An immune atlas for Asia. For too long, far too long, precision medicine in the Global South has been hampered by the fact that data has been mostly from places elsewhere. Lately, there have been efforts in Africa and Asia to change this. The newest such initiative comes from Singapore where A*STAR GIS and partners across Asia just dropped the Asian Immune Diversity Atlas (AIDA) - the first single-cell map of Asian immune systems, based on 1.2 million cells from 625 healthy donors in five countries. AIDA is part of the Human Cell Atlas network, and its next phase will include patient data. It’s a major step toward Asia-first medical innovation, finally building reference datasets that look like the people they’re meant to help.
(Cell)
The squirrel did it. Scientists have traced a 2017 outbreak of mpox in sooty mangabeys back to an unlikely suspect: the fire-footed rope squirrel. The discovery, published in Research Square, marks the first time researchers have documented an mpox outbreak in wild non-human primates - and pinpointed a possible spillover source. The squirrel in question is cute, elusive, and now potentially infamous. The outbreak occurred in Côte d’Ivoire’s Taï National Park, where long-term surveillance allowed scientists to study infected mangabeys and trace the viral lineage. This finding adds weight to the argument that zoonotic threats aren’t always lurking in bats or pangolins or unfortunate minks. Sometimes it’s the squirrel.
(Research Square)
Decay and disarray. Among everything else that Africa is facing a shortage of, Africa is also facing a severe shortage of oral health workers, with only about 57,000 professionals serving the entire continent - just 0.37 per 10,000 people. This is far below the 1.33 per 10,000 needed to achieve basic universal health coverage targets. As a result, millions lack access to essential dental care, exacerbating the burden of preventable oral diseases like tooth decay and gum disease. This when 42% of the African population already suffers from untreated oral diseases. If left unchecked, this shortage won’t just rot teeth - it’ll eat into health systems, productivity, and equity across the continent.
(WHO)
Bottom line
Cloudy with a chance of shortfalls. The UNESCAP's 2025 Economic and Social Survey paints a sobering picture: Asia-Pacific economies are grappling with the dual challenges of climate change and economic instability. With average growth slowing to 4.8% in 2024, down from 5.2% in 2023, the region faces mounting public debt, trade tensions, and the pressing need for climate resilience. Eleven countries, including Afghanistan, Nepal, and Myanmar, are identified as particularly vulnerable to climate-induced economic shocks.
(ESCAP)
Long reads
Shots fired, lives saved. Not a long read strictly speaking but, in the face of an increasingly vaccine-hostile world, five charts from Nature that show how many lives vaccines have already saved.
(Nature)
A new world order can't come soon enough. Those US aid funding cuts we mentioned earlier? Two pieces from Devex and Science that highlight just how devastating the impact of those cuts is.
(Devex, Science)
Africa's ICU crisis. A new survey across 10 African countries reveals that critically ill patients are often not receiving the intensive care they need, due to shortages of trained staff, equipment, and basic supplies.
(The Lancet)
Oh, and Gopal Nair doesn't want you to see this.