Sweeping UK aid cuts have drastically reduced direct bilateral funding to African countries, posing a severe threat to the continent’s most fragile health systems. Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) officials recently confirmed a steep 31% multi-year reduction of the foreign aid budget, shrinking overall spending from £13.7 billion to an estimated £9.2 billion by […] Continue reading ->
The gas that keeps hospital MRI scanners running has been caught in the crossfire of the war in Iran, raising the prospect of diagnostic delays, rising costs and rationing of one of modern medicine’s most important imaging tools. Roughly a quarter of all helium consumed worldwide goes toward cooling the superconducting magnets inside MRI scanners. […] Continue reading ->
CAIRO, Egypt – In the bustling neighbourhood of Heliopolis in Africa’s most populated city, it’s nearly impossible to cross the streets without risking a 40-mile-per-hour collision. A man driving a motorcycle nestles his phone against his ear. A car whizzes by with a child sitting on the lap of the driver. The chaotic scene was […] Continue reading ->
DAVOS – In this snow-covered Alpine town where the world’s rich, powerful and elite met in January for the World Economic Forum, a quiet but consequential shift in thinking about dementia research crystallized – one with the potential to shape political engagements and research investments for the coming decade. Long treated as a disease primarily […] Continue reading ->
Argentina took a step backwards last month when it revoked key guidelines that defined what could – and could not – be patented in its pharmaceutical sector. For more than a decade, Argentina’s patentability guidelines have helped prevent pharmaceutical monopolies, enabling timely competition to enter the market, lowering prices of medical tools, and improving people’s […] Continue reading ->
Cervical cancer should no longer be killing women. It is one of the few cancers that we already know how to prevent, detect early, and treat effectively. Yet it remains the fourth most common cancer among women worldwide, causing around 600,000 new cases and 340,000 deaths each year. The tragedy is not just the scale […] Continue reading ->
From stalled Pathogen Access and Benefit Sharing (PABS) negotiations to failing consensus in global climate policies, United Nations structures face a profound crisis. Diplomats are currently being forced to explore alternative governance models to bridge the disconnect between sluggish, power-driven diplomacy and the rapid, equitable action required in health and climate crises. This institutional rupture […] Continue reading ->
More than 60 countries now include refugees and migrants in their national health policies, according to a new World Health Organization (WHO) report tracking progress on commitments first set out by the World Health Assembly in 2019. The finding, drawn from a survey of 93 member states, is the first systematic count of how countries […] Continue reading ->
The Human papillomavirus (HPV35), globally associated with only 2% of invasive cervical cancers (ICC), has a disproportionately higher prevalence in sub‐Saharan Africa, reaching rates of 22-30% in some countries among women with ICC lesions, according to a new study. Recently, a high-level panel called for redoubled efforts in HPV vaccination, screening and treatment to meet […] Continue reading ->
Social media giants are liable for harming young users, according to two landmark court rulings in the United States this week that order Meta and YouTube to pay millions in damages. On Wednesday, a Los Angeles jury found that Meta (parent company of Facebook and Instagram) and YouTube were liable for creating addictive products that […] Continue reading ->