Emergency vaccines slash deaths by 60%
The
Gavi vaccine alliance
, which backed the study, said it collaborated with researchers at Burnet Institute in Australia to provide the world's first look at the historical impact of emergency immunisation efforts on public health and global health security.
"For the first time, we are able to comprehensively quantify the benefit, in human and economic terms, of deploying vaccines against outbreaks of some of the deadliest
infectious diseases
," Gavi chief Sania Nishtar said in a statement.
The study, published this week in the British Medical Journal Global Health, examined 210 outbreaks of five infectious diseases - cholera, Ebola, measles, meningitis and yellow fever - in 49 lower-income countries between 2000 and 2023. Vaccine roll-outs in these settings had a dramatic impact, with the study showing they reduced both the number of infections and deaths by almost 60% across five diseases.
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Time of India
a day ago
- Time of India
Meet Adam Kovalčík: Teen scientist whose breakthrough could slash the costs of lifesaving drugs for Ebola, COVID-19 and more
Image credits: Getty Images (Representative Image) A 19-year-old from Slovakia was flying to an international science competition in Ohio, with an idea that he didn't expect to win big, but loved enough to showcase to the world. Adam Kovalčík, a teen from a small village in a European country, not only walked away with the George D. Yancopoulos Innovator Award but also a $100,000 top prize for his breakthrough idea that could slash the cost of antiviral drugs. Adam Kovalčík's innovative method Image credits: Getty Images According to a Business Insider report, Kovalčík created a simplified drug production method using corn husks in place of the most costly ingredients. The young prodigy had aimed to make galidesivir cheaper and faster to produce. The drug targets RNA viruses, including Ebola, Zika and COVID-19. He replaced the standard beginning materials with furfuryl alcohol, a compound that is derived from corn waste. Additionally, rather than assembling the molecule in multiple stages, he formed the core sugar in seven reactions, developing a shorter 10-step method from the conventional 15. This cuts the production time from nine to five days and reduces the cost per gram from $75 to just $12.50. What lies ahead? While his method would need to go through clinical trials before any wide-scale applications, the Regeneron judges were impressed and described his presentation as airtight. "This could be a huge step to help prevent some of these RNA viruses," said Chris RoDee, chemist and chair of the judging committee and retired patent examiner. "I cannot describe this feeling," Kovalčík told Business Insider after the live ceremony, adding that he was surprised to win, especially coming from a small Slovakian village. After the competition, he filed a preliminary patent and returned to his university lab to continue refining the synthesis. According to early computer modelling, one new molecule from his work may bind more effectively to viral enzymes than galidesivir. Kovalčík is also working on a side project that turns corn waste into fragrance compounds. His work is a part of a growing movement of scientists who are rethinking food waste to create big breakthroughs from small labs.
New Indian Express
27-07-2025
- New Indian Express
Hyderabad to get disease surveillance unit soon to boost epidemic preparedness
HYDERABAD: A Metropolitan Surveillance Unit (MSU), a special facility equipped to monitor and analyse disease patterns in urban areas, is set to become operational in Hyderabad within the next two months. Approved by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoH&FW) under the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), the MSU will enhance the city's preparedness for disease outbreaks, drawing from lessons learned during the Covid-19 pandemic. The MSU will function as a specialised disease surveillance hub, conducting advanced diagnostic testing for communicable diseases and issuing alerts for potential outbreaks. It will not handle routine lab testing but will focus on diseases listed under the Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme (IDSP), including anthrax, chickenpox, diphtheria, measles, meningitis, mumps, pertussis, Ebola, Zika, Nipah and yellow fever, among others. GHMC officials told TNIE that the MSU will serve as a crucial node for surveillance, early warning and rapid response to outbreaks. 'The objective is to strengthen urban public health systems by enabling data-driven action. MSUs will be the first line of defence in identifying and containing future epidemics,' they said.
Economic Times
27-07-2025
- Economic Times
Study estimates over 9% of world's lands at high risk of animal-to-human infections
Over nine per cent of the world's land area is at "high" or "very high" risk of a zoonotic outbreak -- triggered when an infection spreads from an animal to a human or vice versa, such as the Covid pandemic, according to a published in the journal Science Advances also estimate 3 per cent of the global population to be living in extremely risky areas, and about a fifth in medium-risk areas. Researchers, including those from the European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC) Scientific Development Programmes Unit in Italy, analysed location-specific information from the 'Global Infectious Diseases and Epidemiology Network' dataset and the World Health Organization's (WHO) list of diseases prioritised according to their potential for causing an epidemic or a Ebola, coronavirus-related MERS and SARS, and Nipah are among the most prioritised infections in the WHO's team's analysis suggests that conditions driven by climate change -- higher temperatures and rainfall, and water shortage -- elevate the risk of zoonosis, or 'spillover events'. The study "presents a global risk map and an epidemic risk index that combines countries' specific risk with their capacities for preparing and responding to zoonotic threats (excluding SARS-CoV-2)." "Our results indicate that 9.3 per cent of the global land surface is at high (6.3 per cent) or very high (three per cent) risk," the authors also estimated about 7 per cent of Asia's and 5 per cent of Africa's land area to be at high and very high risk of outbreak, following Latin America (27 per cent) and Oceania (18.6 per cent).Overall, the authors found that climate-related changes to the environment substantially drove a region's vulnerability to the risk of a spillover wrote, "This underscores the need for continued monitoring and the integration of climate adaptation and mitigation efforts into public health planning." "Translating these risk estimates into an epidemic risk index allows for the identification of high-risk areas and supports policymakers in improving response capacities, allocating resources effectively, and fostering international collaboration to address global health threats," the team said. A study by the Indian Council of Medical Research found that over 8 per cent of outbreaks reported between 2018 and 2023 under the country's infectious disease surveillance system were zoonotic. Of a total of 6,948 outbreaks analysed, 583 (8.3 per cent) were spread to humans from animals. Outbreaks were also found to consistently peak during June, July, and August. The findings were published in The Lancet Regional Southeast Asia journal in May this year.
