Conflict is reshaping the global trade map, and the collapse of Afghanistan’s opium production could, paradoxically, be pushing the world even faster toward more dangerous synthetics. Meanwhile, governments continue to prioritise punishment over care for people caught up in the cycle of drug use. Nearly half a million people died from drug use in 2023, […] Continue reading ->
The Democratic Republic of the Congo’s Ebola outbreak is the fastest-growing on record, Africa CDC told its weekly briefing on Wednesday, with confirmed cases up 25% over the past week to 1,759 and deaths reaching 600. The outbreak’s reproductive number is 1.4, meaning every 10 infections lead to roughly 14 more, while the case fatality […] Continue reading ->
On the day France recorded its hottest temperature on record, a coalition of health ministers, officials and advocates huddled in a sweaty, half-full auditorium in Paris to take stock of a campaign they have spent a decade waging: the fight to put human health at the centre of the world’s response to climate change. The […] Continue reading ->
The stepping-stone meetings on the road to COP31 in Antalya unfolding in Bonn this week brought the first real clarity on what the incoming presidency wants the next UN climate summit to deliver on: electrification, reducing waste, and the energy efficiency of buildings and construction. The three headline targets call for electricity to meet 35% […] Continue reading ->
A landmark UNICEF report that maps children’s exposure to overlapping climate hazards finds that almost half the world’s children – 1.1 billion kids – now contend with at least three threats at once. To reach school each morning, 15-year-old Lorna first has to swim across the Kemp Welch River, known to locals for its strong […] Continue reading ->
The global HIV response is facing its “biggest storm” since the world united against the epidemic, UNAIDS warned Friday, as it published new data showing donor funding for HIV/AID prevention and community services critical to containing infections dropped by almost one quarter last year. The Global AIDS Brief is being published just 10 days ahead […] Continue reading ->
The world will permanently breach the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C warming limit within about four years if emissions continue at current levels, a major global stocktake of the climate system published Thursday has found. The fourth annual Indicators of Global Climate Change report, published at the UN climate meetings in Bonn as negotiators begin to lay […] Continue reading ->
GENEVA – Malaria has adapted and evolved for at least 30 million years. The oldest identified samples of the parasite were found in mosquitoes preserved in amber, from a family of insects ancient enough to have shared the planet with the dinosaurs. How many millions of people it has killed across the roughly 300,000 years […] Continue reading ->
GENEVA – The 79th World Health Assembly closed last Saturday after a long week of negotiations over the globe’s most pressing health crises: financing gaps, rare diseases, a workforce shortage counted in the millions, a string of wars and humanitarian emergencies, and dozens of other resolutions. Yet one policy area affecting half of the global […] Continue reading ->
A rare and deadly strain of the Ebola virus is spreading rapidly through a region of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) that has never previously experienced the disease, pushing suspected cases past 1,000 this week amid severe logistical hurdles and mounting community resistance. The outbreak, caused by the Bundibugyo version of the virus, […] Continue reading ->