Ebola in Congo reaches two more districts, and 8 in 10 new cases were never on a list of known contacts

The rest of the day

9 more stories on this beat.

Each with its own sources. None of these is a link to the story above.

1. 02

   Bangladesh starts a measles campaign for 3.4 million children

   Bangladesh began a month-long measles and rubella vaccination campaign on Saturday, aimed at 3.4 million children who were never vaccinated or were missed. [9] It covers children from 6 months to 59 months old, because Bangladesh's government lowered the usual starting age of 9 months during the outbreak. [9] The country has counted 1,087 measles deaths, confirmed and suspected, and 101 of them were confirmed in a laboratory. [9] Health experts blame vaccination campaigns that were cancelled or delayed in 2024 and 2025. [9]

   Deaths counted, confirmed and suspected1,087

   Deaths confirmed in a laboratory101

   Why it matters — The US disease agency calls it the world's largest measles outbreak, with nearly 187,000 suspected cases since 15 March. [9] Babies under 9 months were too young for the vaccine, and they were helping the virus spread. [9]

2. 03

   Mpox returns to the Ebola outbreak's home city

   Doctors in Bunia, a city in northeastern Congo, confirmed a case of mpox on Friday in a 21-year-old woman. [8] Mpox is a virus that causes fever and skin sores and spreads through close contact. [8] Congo ended its national mpox emergency in April, after three years and more than 34,000 confirmed cases, but warned the virus could come back. [8] A second woman is awaiting test results, and five suspected cases in Bunia are under investigation. [8]

   Why it matters — Bunia is in Ituri, the province where the Ebola outbreak was declared on 15 May. [8] A health official said the Ebola response is making it harder to watch for other infections. [8]

3. 04

   Mailing medicines into the US gets harder

   From 22 October, medicines mailed into the United States from abroad must clear customs through a licensed customs broker, with a money guarantee, the Wall Street Journal reported. [11] Few prescriptions sent to one person by post have ever had to clear that bar. [11] Until now Americans could import their own medicines this way, a route STAT, a health news site, calls a loophole. [11] The US government says small foreign parcels that pay no tariffs and send no tracking data carry illegal goods. [11]

   Why it matters — The US government says small parcels send no tracking data, so the rule covers all of them rather than the ones it suspects. [11] It lands on people who have been getting their own prescriptions by post. [11]

4. 05

   A 15-minute blood test for feverish babies

   Doctors led by Tommaso Bellini of the Gaslini Institute in Genoa, Italy, tried a blood test that tells whether a feverish baby has a bacterial or a viral infection in 15 to 20 minutes. [10] It measures two proteins on white blood cells: CD64 rises when the body fights bacteria, and CD169 when it fights a virus. [10] In 85 babies under 90 days old, it correctly sorted all 15 bacterial infections, 44 viral ones and 26 babies with no infection. [10] Bellini presented the results at a European emergency medicine meeting in Paris. [10]

   Why it matters — Today's tests take hours, so many feverish babies get antibiotics, though only about 15 in 100 have a serious bacterial infection. [10] Antibiotics given without need help bacteria become resistant, and Bellini now plans a trial in 300 to 500 babies. [10]

5. 06

   1.1 million on weight-loss drugs with no recorded reason

   A study looked at the medical records of more than 92 million US adults. [11] It found more than 1.1 million taking drugs like Ozempic with no record of a condition that would make them eligible, such as obesity or diabetes. [11] The New York Times reported the study, and STAT summed it up. [11] That is a little more than 1 in every 100 adults whose records were checked. [11] The researchers did not look at why. [11] Doctors said many people probably take the drugs to lose a few pounds, or in hope of other benefits. [11]

   Why it matters — The study can show who takes the drugs but not why, because the reason is missing from the records. [11] Novo Nordisk, which makes Ozempic and Wegovy, is meanwhile in a US court fight over a copy of its Wegovy pen. [12]

6. 07

   Viatris sues Novo over the Wegovy pen

   Viatris, a company that makes copies of medicines once their patents run out, has sued Novo Nordisk in a federal court in Delaware. [12] Its Mylan unit wants a ruling that its planned copy of Wegovy, Novo's weight-loss drug, would not break a Novo patent on how the single-dose pen is used. [12] Copies of Wegovy and Ozempic cannot be sold in the US until 2032, when the patents on their active ingredient, semaglutide, run out. [12] Novo has settled earlier fights over copies with Mylan and other drugmakers. [12]

   Why it matters — Novo earned nearly $31 billion from Wegovy and Ozempic last year, so each patent around the drug is worth a court fight. [12] Novo declined to comment, citing the case. [12]

7. 08

   UK myeloma patients ask for faster access

   Myeloma UK, a charity for people with myeloma, a blood cancer, published a report saying UK patients miss treatments already used elsewhere in Europe. [14] It says a patient in Germany would have about a third more treatments available. [14] NICE, the body that judges whether England's health service should pay for a medicine, said it approved 94% of the cancer drugs it assessed in 2025/26. [14] This month the NHS approved DVRD, a four-drug mix tailored to how well each patient responds. [14]

   Why it matters — In trials, 84% of people on DVRD were still free of myeloma after four years, and about 1,900 people a year could get it. [14] Myeloma affects more than 35,000 people in the UK. [14]

8. 09

   Pandemic plans on paper did not predict deaths

   The NUS-Lancet PRIME Commission, a group of researchers, launched its final report on pandemic readiness during this year's UN General Assembly. [15] It drew on 20 country case studies, three of them in Africa, and 819 interviews. [15] The commentary says readiness scores built from plans and equipment were poor at predicting how countries fared in COVID-19. [15] The authors of a commentary in Nature Africa say their own 2021 study found countries with higher scores were more likely to record more deaths. [15]

   Why it matters — The commentary names the Ebola outbreak in Congo, where trust in the response has been a major problem, as a reason to build plans with communities. [15] It says the work of community health workers needs steady money between emergencies, not only once a crisis starts. [15]

9. 10

   Roche pays $70m now for a drug-hunting method

   Roche, the Swiss drug company, will pay Atavistik Bio $70 million up front to help find new drugs for heart, kidney and metabolic diseases. [13] Up to $1.9 billion more will follow only if the work reaches set goals. [13] Atavistik, from Cambridge, Massachusetts, studies where the body's own small molecules stick to proteins, to find hidden pockets a drug could grip. [13] Its own lead drug is in an early trial for hereditary haemorrhagic telangiectasia, a severe disease that affects many organs. [13]

   $70mPaid now

   vsvs

   up to $1.9bnPaid only if it works

   Why it matters — Roche has mostly sold cancer drugs, and heart, kidney and metabolic disease is a field it is moving into. [13] Most of the $2 billion in the headline is paid later, and only if the work reaches set goals. [13]