💉 Africa says hi to malaria; Africa says hi to AMR; The world says hi to chikungunya, maybe
#571 | The pharmacy of the world makes some shady shit; Somewhere between Wuhan and Epsilon, we all got old; Yes, vaccination works
Hello, and welcome back to The Kable for one last time this most glorious of Julys... the coolest July of the rest of our lives.
In disease news, not content with mpox and cholera and mystery outbreaks in assorted hues, Africa is now grappling with a resurgence of malaria across its south, with Botswana, eSwatini, Namibia and Zimbabwe reporting new outbreaks.
Not content with dealing with age-old diseases, the Africa CDC says Africa is well-established on its path to a date with AMR, with a new study revealing drug resistance is rampant across 14 countries already.
Elsewhere, the WHO says we're at fresh risk from chikungunya. To be fair, while this news about the WHO sounding an alarm over chikungunya is available across the web, we haven't been able to find a single WHO resource that actually mentions it. However, Health Policy Watch, whose reporting we implicitly trust, has covered it too, and hence, it must be true.
In Palestine, seemingly not content with killing defenceless babies and starving them when bombing doesn't work, a rogue state this week attacked a WHO warehouse.
Speaking of rogues, in the US, they're looking at revisiting organ transplants after reports that not all organ donations were necessarily entirely consensual.
And speaking of the US, new data from that country, uploaded to GISAID, reveals the presence of bird flu in flies. Yay.
And finally, tired of failing to reach the magical 10,000 steps per day milestone? A new study says you can now aim to miss 7,000 steps daily instead.
Before we dive into the stories of the week…
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Stories Of The Week
Old. Older. Oldest. A new study out of the University of Nottingham suggests that just living through the pandemic - no infection required - may have fast-tracked brain ageing. Researchers analysed MRI scans from nearly 1,000 adults in the UK Biobank and found that post-pandemic brains looked older than pre-pandemic ones, especially in men, older adults, and those from disadvantaged backgrounds. The good news, hehe, is that only those who actually caught Covid showed real dips in cognitive function, like slower thinking and reduced mental flexibility. So what aged us? Not the virus, but the vibe. Prolonged stress, isolation, and uncertainty all seem to have left their mark. And while the study doesn't mention it, the interminable doom-scrolling might have had a part to play as well.
(Nature Communications)
Spurious and spuriouser. Can we all agree on one basic tenet? Cough syrup shouldn’t kill children. We believe that should be the case. But evidently, many makers of these cough syrups don't. A new joint report from the WHO and the UN Office on Drugs and Crime has laid bare a disturbing reality: over 300 people - mostly kids in Africa and Asia - have died since 2022 after consuming cough and paracetamol syrups laced with industrial chemicals like diethylene glycol (DEG) and ethylene glycol (EG). These aren't obscure compounds - they’re found in brake fluid and antifreeze. And they’re lethal even in tiny doses. Why is this happening? Weak regulations, profit-hungry manufacturers, and criminal networks exploiting supply chain loopholes. The syrups in question were cheap, widely available without prescriptions, and often marketed specifically for children. In other words, this wasn’t a tragic accident - it was a foreseeable, preventable disaster. Fixing this will take more than FDA-style inspections and polite regulatory memos. But until that happens, the medicine cabinet remains a potential crime scene.
(WHO)
Breakthroughs
Africa gets its own test. A new diagnostic tool, RT-LAMP, is helping flip the script on pandemic surveillance in Africa. Unlike PCR, it doesn’t need fancy lab equipment or RNA extraction - just a heat source and a saliva sample. The test delivers results in under an hour, with up to 89% sensitivity and 99% specificity, making it far more accurate than antigen kits and far more accessible than PCR. Tested in real-world conditions across Kenya, Ethiopia, Nigeria, and Angola, the RT-LAMP platform has already proved it’s not just lab hype. Backed by the Gates Foundation and built through a multi-country, multi-agency effort, it’s part of a broader strategy to build diagnostic self-sufficiency across the continent, not just for Covid, but for Zika, Dengue, and whatever comes next.
(The Lancet Global Health)
Get that jab, before that jab gets you. A simulation of 1.2 million people proves what public health experts have been saying for years: flu shots don’t just protect you, they reduce infections across entire communities. Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh found that when at least 51% of a population got vaccinated, total flu cases dropped by up to 41%, even among the unvaccinated. But don’t get smug. The unvaccinated still had up to a 73% higher risk of infection. And in high-transmission scenarios, like the early days of Covid, indirect protection all but vanished. Herd immunity has limits. Direct vaccination is still the best defence for yourself and for everyone else.
(JAMA Network Open)
Bottom line
Burn, baby, burn. The world hit 1.52°C of warming in 2024 - past the Paris Agreement’s supposed red line - and only 25 countries have submitted updated climate plans. Africa, already reeling from crop losses, water scarcity, and extreme heat, is among the hardest hit. Meanwhile, the G20 -responsible for 80% of emissions - is dragging its feet, with just five members filing 2035 targets. At current rates, the world’s remaining carbon budget will be blown in under three years. And yet, climate data is still treated like a quarterly footnote, not a five-alarm fire. With COP30 looming, governments need to show up with more than platitudes. The window for 1.5°C is closed. The question now is how much worse we’ll let it get. We're pretty sure that is not a question to which we will like the answer, honestly.
(The Conversation)
Raindrops keep falling on my head. Oooh, burn. Because, increasingly, rain everywhere contains Trifluoroacetic acid (TFA), a human-made forever chemical. Along with rain, TFA is increasingly turning up in rivers, beer, urine, tree needles, and even Arctic ice. Scientists apparently are still divided on whether TFA is harmless, harmful, or just misunderstood. Who said lobbying is a bad word?
(Nature)
Oh, and Gopal Nair doesn't want you to see this.
Its indded very disastrous to know that the how children are being exposed to harmful chemicals by the profit hungry pharmaceutical industrh