LONDON: A third British national has been diagnosed with suspected hantavirus linked to a cruise ship outbreak, health officials said Friday. The &quot;additional suspected case of a British national&quot; was on the remote South Atlantic island of Tristan da Cunha, the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) said. Two other British nationals remain in hospital in the Netherlands and South Africa following the outbreak on the MV Hondius cruise ship. &quot;None of the British citizens onboard are currently reporting symptoms, but they are being closely monitored,&quot; the agency said. The ship is expected to dock in Tenerife on Sunday, and government officials will be on the ground to help British nationals disembarking. The Foreign Office is chartering &quot;a dedicated repatriation flight&quot; for British ship passengers and crew only. &quot;This flight will be free of charge,&quot; the agency added. The British passengers will have to isolate for 45 days once they return to the UK, and will be closely monitored and tested by the agency.

United Kingdom

Three British people have been diagnosed with the suspected Hantavirus after the cruise ship outbreak, its health security agency said.

Third Briton has suspected hantavirus after cruise outbreak: health agency

ISLAMABAD: A US federal judge on Tuesday criminally sentenced OxyContin-maker Purdue Pharma over its role in the opioid crisis, ahead of upcoming bankruptcy proceedings and its dissolution. Last year, several US states reached a settlement with Purdue and the Sackler family, which had owned the company for decades, with a bankruptcy plan that will see funds routed to affected communities and individuals. The total amount to be paid in fines, forfeitures and penalties surpasses $8 billion. Purdue and other opioid makers and distributors were accused of encouraging free-wheeling prescription of their products through aggressive marketing tactics while hiding how addictive the drugs are. The company is set to be dissolved on May 1, with the remnants becoming Knoa Pharma, a public benefit company that will provide opioid use disorder treatments and overdose reversal medicines. For more than six hours on Tuesday, US Judge Madeline Cox Arleo listened to dozens of victims and their families testify about the impact Purdue Pharma and the opioid epidemic had on them. She then ordered Steve Miller, Purdue Pharma&#39;s board chair, to apologize to them. During the proceedings to resolve a Department of Justice probe and clear the way for bankruptcy, Arleo read the names of more than 200 victims who had submitted written statements before the hearing. &quot;These people are not statistics in an epidemiological study,&quot; she said, adding that the testimonies were &quot;heartbreaking.&quot; The judge also apologized on behalf of the US government, saying it had &quot;failed&quot; to protect the public from Purdue Pharma, whose practices were &quot;driven by greed&quot; and had a &quot;corporate strategy much like a criminal enterprise.&quot; While many testifying on Tuesday urged the settlement agreement to be rejected -- in part because it protects the Sackler family from criminal prosecution -- Arleo called it the &quot;best route I see among the options before me.&quot; She urged the lawyers handling the bankruptcy proceedings to honor their promises of compensation. For many people, opioid addiction begins with prescribed pain pills, such as OxyContin, before they increase their consumption and eventually turn to illicit drugs such as heroin and fentanyl, an extremely powerful synthetic opioid. From 1999 through 2023, around 806,000 people died from opioid overdoses in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Food

Purdue Pharma was criminally sentenced over its opioid crisis role, with penalties exceeding $8 billion, before dissolution into Knoa Pharma, as victims condemned the settlement protecting the Sacklers.

Purdue Pharma sentenced ahead of bankruptcy

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ISLAMABAD: The World Health Organization (WHO) has commended Pakistan&rsquo;s progress toward achieving Universal Health Coverage (UHC), with the agency&rsquo;s representative in Islamabad calling for continued partner and donor support to help the country further strengthen its health system.&nbsp;In a report released on World Health Day, WHO Representative to Pakistan Dr. Dapeng Luo highlighted the government&rsquo;s commitment to expanding quality health services, noting that Pakistan has made &ldquo;notable milestones&rdquo; in improving national health indicators.&nbsp;Last week, WHO hosted a dialogue under the theme &ldquo;Health: It&rsquo;s on the Government,&rdquo; bringing together senior officials including the Coordinator to the Prime Minister on Health, Dr. Malik Mukhtar Ahmad Bharath.&nbsp;Representatives from the Ministry of Planning, Development and Special Initiatives, the Benazir Income Support Program, the Sehat Sahulat Program (SSP), and other national institutions also participated.&nbsp;According to the report, Pakistan&rsquo;s UHC Index has risen significantly, moving from 40 in 2015 to 52.7 in 2022.&nbsp;Dr. Luo praised the government&rsquo;s efforts, saying the achievements reflect &ldquo;Pakistan&rsquo;s commitment to strengthening its health system and ensuring better care for its people.&rdquo;&nbsp;He encouraged continued collaboration with partners to help the country reach its 2030 UHC target, emphasizing the importance of sustained investment and coordinated action.&nbsp;The dialogue also showcased major national achievements, including the successful expansion of the Sehat Sahulat Program, which now provides health coverage to 190 million people.&nbsp;Launched in 2016 to support families below the poverty line, SSP was expanded between 2020 and 2021 to move Pakistan closer to universal health coverage, the report noted.&nbsp;Participants reaffirmed their commitment to advancing UHC as a national priority, highlighting the importance of accessible, equitable, reliable, and high-quality services for all citizens.&nbsp;National guidelines launchedThe report further detailed the launch of comprehensive national guidelines and training program designed to strengthen reproductive, maternal, newborn, child, and adolescent health across the country.&nbsp;&ldquo;In Pakistan, around 4 million pregnant women and newborns receive health care services from the public and private sectors each year,&rdquo; the report said.&nbsp;Dr. Luo underscored the importance of continued progress in this area, stating: &ldquo;Improving the lives of these mothers and newborns is essential to ensuring good health for all. No real sustainable development can be achieved without healthy mothers and newborns.&rdquo;&nbsp;The report also noted that International Universal Health Coverage Day aims to promote the need for strong and resilient health systems that &ldquo;work for everyone, no matter who they are, where they live, or how much money they have.&rdquo;

Health

WHO praised Pakistan’s progress on Universal Health Coverage, noting major improvements, expanded health services, and rising UHC indicators, while urging stronger partner support to meet 2030 targets and sustain nationwide healthcare reforms

WHO praises Pakistan’s progress, calls for stronger partner support

KARACHI: Pakistan has vaccinated about 9 million adolescent girls against the virus that causes cervical cancer, as part of a continuing national campaign that has overcome early setbacks fueled by skeptics online, the health minister said Friday. Health Minister Mustafa Kamal said the campaign that began Sept. 15 is aiming to vaccinate 13 million girls aged 9 to 14 against the human papillomavirus, or HPV, which causes most cervical cancers. He said the program so far achieved 70% of its goal. The program has overcome what Kamal said were baseless rumors spread by some parents that the vaccine could cause infertility. He gave the vaccine to his own daughter live on stage at an event in Karachi this week to build confidence. &ldquo;By the grace of God, administering the vaccine to my daughter publicly had a huge impact,&rdquo; Kamal told The Associated Press. &ldquo;From the fifth day of the campaign, refusal rates began dropping and acceptance climbed to 70&ndash;80% in some districts.&rdquo; However, many parents are still reluctant. &ldquo;I have heard that the vaccination is being used to make women infertile and reduce the population of Muslims,&rdquo; said Ali Sheikh, a mother of two in Karachi, the capital of Sindh province. She said that &ldquo;social media is full of such claims,&rdquo; and that she was advised by relatives not to allow health workers to vaccinate her daughters. Health worker Shamim Anwar, 52, said the job of administering the vaccines has been exhausting. &ldquo;It is very difficult work. Many parents refuse because of rumors and hesitate to let us vaccinate their daughters,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;Sometimes we even face humiliation, but we tolerate it because we have to complete the vaccination target,&rdquo; she said, as she went door-to-door for the campaign in Karachi. Cervical cancer is the third most common cancer among Pakistani women after breast and ovarian cancers. Globally, it is the fourth most common. Each year, between 18,000 and 20,000 women in Pakistan die of the disease, according to health authorities. Experts promoted the campaign under the slogan &ldquo;one jab will do the job.&rdquo; Authorities set up vaccination centers and deployed teams to schools nationwide to reach as many girls as possible. Kamal acknowledged that during the first days of the drive, refusals outnumbered acceptances, fueled by false claims that the vaccine campaign is a Western plot to cause infertility. Officials say the vaccine, offered free of charge, typically causes only minor side effects. The 13 million girls targeted in the initial campaign were in Punjab and Sindh provinces and in Pakistan-held Kashmir. The country plans to expand the coverage to additional areas by 2027, hoping to eliminate cervical cancer as a public health problem by 2030. It became the 149th country to add the HPV vaccine to its immunization schedule.

Pakistan has vaccinated 9 million girls against HPV in a national campaign aiming for 13 million. Despite rumors linking the vaccine to infertility, uptake rose after Health Minister Mustafa Kamal publicly vaccinated his daughter to build confidence.

Pakistan vaccinates 9 million girls against cervical cancer despite online backlash

NEW YORK: Infection rates from drug-resistant &ldquo;nightmare bacteria&rdquo; rose almost 70% between 2019 and 2023, according to a new report from Centers for Disease Control and Prevention scientists. Bacteria that are difficult to treat due to the so-called NDM gene primarily drove the increase, CDC researchers wrote in an article published Monday in the Annals of Internal Medicine. Only two antibiotics work against those infections, and the drugs are expensive and must be administered through an IV, researchers said. Bacteria with the gene were once considered exotic, linked to a small number of patients who received medical care overseas. Though the numbers are still small, the rate of US cases jumped more than fivefold in recent years, the researchers reported. &ldquo;The rise of NDMs in the US is a grave danger and very worrisome,&rdquo; said David Weiss, an Emory University infectious diseases researcher, in an email. It&#39;s likely many people are unrecognized carriers of the drug-resistant bacteria, which could lead to community spread, the CDC scientists said. That may play out in doctors&rsquo; offices across the country, as infections long considered routine &mdash; like urinary tract infections &mdash; could become harder to treat, said Dr. Maroya Walters, one of the report&rsquo;s authors. Antimicrobial resistance occurs when germs such as bacteria and fungi gain the power to fight off the drugs designed to kill them. The misuse of antibiotics was a big reason for the rise &mdash; unfinished or unnecessary prescriptions that didn&rsquo;t kill the germs made them stronger. In recent years, the CDC has drawn attention to &ldquo; nightmare bacteria &rdquo; resistant to a wide range of antibiotics. That includes carbapenems, a class of antibiotics considered a last resort for treatment of serious infections. Researchers drew data from 29 states that do the necessary testing and reporting of carbapenem-resistant bacteria. They counted 4,341 cases of carbapenem-resistant bacterial infections from those states in 2023, with 1,831 of them the NDM variety. The researchers did not say how many of the infected people died. The rate of carbapenem-resistant infections rose from just under 2 per 100,000 people in 2019 to more than 3 per 100,000 in 2023 &mdash; an increase of 69%. But the rate of NDM cases rose from around 0.25 to about 1.35 &mdash; an increase of 460%, the authors said. A researcher not involved in the study said the increase is probably related to the COVID-19 pandemic. &ldquo;We know that there was a huge surge in antibiotic use during the pandemic, so this likely is reflected in increasing drug resistance,&rdquo; said Dr. Jason Burnham, a Washington University researcher, in an email. The CDC&rsquo;s count is only a partial picture. Many states are not fully testing and reporting cases. Even in states that do, cases tend to be among hospital patients sick enough to warrant special testing. Many hospitals also aren&rsquo;t able to do the testing needed to detect certain forms of genetic resistance. The CDC researchers did not have data from some of the most populous states, including California, Florida, New York and Texas, which means the absolute number of US infections &ldquo;is definitely underestimated,&rdquo; Burnham said. This is not the first study to report a rise. A CDC report published in June noted an increase in NDM cases in New York City between 2019 and 2024.

Americas

CDC researchers report U.S. infections from drug-resistant “nightmare bacteria” surged nearly 70% since 2019, driven by NDM gene strains. Limited treatment options, antibiotic misuse, and underreported cases raise fears of harder-to-treat common infections nationwide.

Articles tagged with "Health"

Third Briton has suspected hantavirus after cruise outbreak: health agency

Purdue Pharma sentenced ahead of bankruptcy

WHO praises Pakistan’s progress, calls for stronger partner support

Pakistan vaccinates 9 million girls against cervical cancer despite online backlash

'Nightmare bacteria' cases are increasing in the US