Health

Investigation finds very high levels of lead and arsenic in homes near a factory processing US toxic waste

Raquel Villarreal lives in a bright-yellow house in Mexico’s Monterrey metropolitan area with her family and nine cats. Here, the emergency medicine doctor has raised three daughters, one of whom died at the age of 14.

Just steps away is an industrial plant that operates 24 hours a day, emitting pollution that neighbors say blankets the neighborhood and which Villarreal says is hard to remove from her car.

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As superbugs spread across the globe, death rates from antimicrobial resistance are set to double, says England’s former chief medical officer

Dame Sally Davies has a straightforward message about the coming year. We face a growing antibiotic emergency that could have devastating impacts on men, women and children across the globe, she says.

Davies, a former chief medical officer for England, has become a leading advocate for global action to fight the scourge of superbugs.

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Products banned on health and environmental grounds, while Milan outlaws outdoor smoking

Belgium has become the EU first country to ban the sale of disposable vapes in an effort to stop young people from becoming addicted to nicotine and to protect the environment.

The sale of disposable electronic cigarettes is banned in Belgium on health and environmental grounds from 1 January. A ban on outdoor smoking in Milan came into force on the same day, as EU countries discuss tighter controls on tobacco.

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Study warns region’s exponential rise in incarceration is fuelling the disease, with cases increasing by 19% between 2015 and 2022

High incarceration rates in Latin America – the region with the world’s fastest-growing prison population – are exacerbating tuberculosis in a region that is bucking the global trend for falling incidents of the disease, experts have warned.

A study published in The Lancet Public Health journal has estimated that, contrary to previous assumptions, HIV/Aids is not the primary risk factor for tuberculosis in the region – as it remains in Africa, for example – but rather imprisonments.

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Increase in cases ‘linked to Ascot Vale’ leads health officials to warn the disease is ‘spreading geographically’

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Victoria has seen a surge of cases of a flesh-eating bacteria, prompting warnings from the chief health officer to take protective measures after it spread through suburban Melbourne.

Buruli ulcer has been known to occur in Australia since the 1940s, with cases noted from Victoria to the Northern Territory and far-north Queensland.

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The disease killed 600,000 people amid 263m cases globally in 2023, says WHO, calling for nations to address funding shortfall

Malaria killed almost 600,000 people in 2023, as cases rose for the fifth consecutive year, according to a new report from the World Health Organization (WHO).

Biological threats such as rising resistance to drugs and insecticides, and climate and humanitarian disasters continue to hamper control efforts, world health leaders warned.

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Afghan students and activists condemn halt to medical courses amid warnings of women dying from lack of healthcare

The Taliban’s ban on Afghan women attending nursing and midwife courses has been condemned as “an outrageous act of ignorance” by human rights organisations.

The official decree detailing the ban has not been shared publicly, but several media reports confirmed that the order was announced at a meeting of the Taliban public health ministry on Monday and communicated to training institutes soon after.

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The move comes as US faces increased threats from bird flu, mpox, measles and other vaccine-preventable diseases

When Donald Trump nominated David Weldon, a 71-year-old doctor from Florida who has long questioned the safety of vaccines, to lead the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), anti-vaccine activists celebrated.

The move comes as the US faces increased threats from bird flu and mpox as well as resurgences of whooping cough, measles and other vaccine-preventable diseases.

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