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Copyright 2026 Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. All rights reserved. Views and opinions expressed in Global Health NOW do not necessarily reflect those of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health or Johns Hopkins University.

Contributors to Global Health NOW include: Brian Simpson, Dayna Kerecman Myers, Annalies Winny, Morgan Coulson, Kate Belz, Melissa Hartman, and Jackie Powder.

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Global Health Now: Global Health NOW: Building Confidence in the Next Generation of Vaccines; and Untethering TB Testing

Wed, 01 Jul 2026 09:42:04 -0400

Global Health NOW: Building Confidence in the Next Generation of Vaccines; and Untethering TB Testing

July 1, 2026

IN FOCUS

A laboratory worker prepares mRNA at the Inserm ART-RNAm laboratory of the Regional Hospital Centre, in Orleans, France. November 18, 2025. Jean-Francois Monier/AFP via Getty

Building Confidence in the Next Generation of Vaccines

Billions of doses of mRNA vaccine have been administered since the first COVID shots to use the technology were brought to market six years ago—and the efficacy, safety, and “transformative” potential only continue to bear out, finds a major new review published in The Lancet.

But public confidence in the vaccines hinges on the ways scientists and health providers communicate about them, researchers say.

Strong findings, per the CBC: mRNA vaccines had 87% effectiveness against SARS-CoV-2 infection and 94% against mortality two to six weeks after vaccination.

‘Exceedingly rare’ side effects: While myocarditis and pericarditis are very rare side effects of mRNA vaccines, COVID itself puts people at far greater risk of the same heart issues, per News Medical.

New promise: The versatility of the mRNA platform is opening a new horizon of treatments for cancer, autoimmune diseases, influenza, and RSV.

Communication is crucial: In the face of uneven mRNA vaccine uptake, the researchers argue that vaccine hesitancy should be met with better communication and accessible information.

“People should feel empowered to ask questions about their health and what they put in their bodies,” lead study author Anna Blakney said in a news release from The University of British Columbia.

A new KFF Health News survey demonstrates the opportunity for trust-building, finding that relatively few adults firmly believe common vaccine myths, but many remain uncertain and open to credible information—a group researchers called the “malleable middle.”

The survey also found that trust in healthcare providers is strongly linked to lower belief in misinformation, reports CIDRAP.

Related:

If a Lyme disease vaccine gets approved, how would it go over? We asked hunters – NPR

RFK Jr Changes Terms for US Vaccine Committee as Email Leak Reveals Sustained Political Interference in Vaccine Policy – Health Policy Watch

Artificial intelligence could usher in a new era of vaccine development – CIDRAP

TECH & INNOVATIONS

Untethering TB Testing

Zambia’s devastating drought in 2024 led to widespread electricity shortages—disrupting TB testing that relies on large, power-intensive molecular diagnostic machines.

But health workers throughout the country will now be equipped with a lifesaving alternative: A handheld, battery-powered device known as a near-point-of-care (NPOC) test.

Designed to operate with minimal power, the NPOC can deliver results in under an hour and offers “immense” potential in underserved communities worldwide.

While the devices won’t replace molecular tests, they will allow doctors to “find people earlier, begin treatment faster and save many lives,” said Benin’s health minister Benjamin Hounkpatin.

Further reach: Over the coming months, the Global Fund and partners will deliver ~3 million tests throughout sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and Southeast Asia.

The Global Fund

GLOBAL HEALTH VOICES

QUICK HITS

Trump’s actions signal a move toward institutionalizing people with disabilities, advocates warn – AP

Witchcraft and WhatsApp: The fight to contain Ebola misinformation – The Telegraph

Rizla maker and cult football fashion house cash in on World Cup – The Times

The shilajit dilemma – Bloomberg

Affordable Healthcare Emerges as a Voter Priority in Purple Nevada – KFF Health News

After Trump's reelection, these U.S. scientists found jobs in the U.K. – NPR

Issue No. 2942

Katharine Collins for Global Health NOW

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Global Health Now: Global Health NOW: America's Ever-Shifting Ground on Gun Policy; and A Vaccine for Strep A May Finally Be in Reach

Tue, 30 Jun 2026 09:44:52 -0400

Global Health NOW: America's Ever-Shifting Ground on Gun Policy; and A Vaccine for Strep A May Finally Be in Reach

June 30, 2026

IN FOCUS

A sign on a door forbids people from carrying guns into a public building on July 17, 2016, in Cleveland, Ohio. Spencer Platt/Getty Images

America's Ever-Shifting Ground on Gun Policy

The U.S. Supreme Court's decision last week striking down Hawaii's default ban on carrying firearms on private property is expected to have ripple effects beyond the state, as lawmakers nationwide grapple with how to craft gun safety laws that can survive the Court's increasingly expansive interpretation of the Second Amendment.

Background: Hawaii legislators passed the law in the wake of a 2022 Supreme Court ruling, which found the Second Amendment gives most people the right to have guns in public, reports the AP.

Hawaii’s law required people to get permission to carry guns into privately owned establishments, and is similar to other laws in California, Maryland, New Jersey and New York.

Implications: Business owners must now explicitly prohibit firearms if they want to keep guns off premises.

And the ruling further complicates how states can craft their own gun policy, per the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions—and “perpetuates an atmosphere of uncertainty for legislators that are committed to protecting their communities from gun violence,” said Kelly Roskam, the Center’s director of law and policy.

Other stories we’ve watched in June, which is Gun Violence Awareness month:

Uninsured gunshot victims in Florida hospitals are discharged significantly sooner than insured patients, even when injuries are similarly severe, finds a new analysis by KFF Health News and The Trace. On average, uninsured patients stayed about six days—three fewer days on average than their insured counterparts.
20+ gun violence prevention bills were signed into law in Virginia this month, per the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions; however, an assault weapons ban has since been blocked by a judge, per WSET News.
The leading cause of non-medical deaths in Alabama children in 2024 was weapons—nearly all firearms, reports the Alabama Reflector.
And new bipartisan Ohio law allows people to temporarily store firearms at gun shops as a suicide prevention measure, per Statehouse News.

GHN EXCLUSIVE COMMENTARY

A Vaccine for Strep A May Finally Be in Reach 

In winter 2022, invasive Strep A and scarlet fever killed several thousand people across Europe, North America, Australia, and East Asia and culminated in a WHO alert—but few reports mentioned that Strep A, the bacterium behind strep throat and impetigo, kills 630,000+ people a year, writes Katharine Collins.

Most of the deaths are in young people in LMICs who suffer from rheumatic heart disease (RHD), in which the body’s immune response to repeated infections misfires and damages heart valves.
In wealthier countries, the threat has largely disappeared, thanks to better housing, sanitation, healthcare, and antibiotics—but globally, around 55 million people still live with RHD.

Collins, who spent her career working on vaccines, had never heard Strep A mentioned as a global health priority—until she joined the Coefficient Giving's Science and Global Health R&D Fund. And yet, there are indications that a Strep A vaccine could work—but research efforts are chronically underfunded, even compared to diseases with similar mortality like malaria and HIV.

Collins details needed actions to address the issue—including multiple vaccine candidates approaching clinical trials and a fund launched by Coefficient Giving to accelerate Strep A vaccine development.

“Economic development could one day end this disease. A vaccine could do it now,” says Collins.

DATA POINT

——

The number of Americans who die every hour from toxic vehicle emissions, according to an analysis by the International Council on Clean Transportation —The Guardian

QUICK HITS

I Was an NIH Program Official. Here's What a Peer Reviewer Doesn’t See: The NEJM editors understand the threat of the proposed federal grant review changes – Medpage Today

What the Return of the New World Screwworm Means for Public Health – Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

Democratic states sue over Medicaid work rules – Axios

Shortage of Chemotherapy Drugs Brings Rationing Fears – The New York Times (gift link)

May as Well Get COVID and Flu Shots on the Same Day, Study Says – MedPage Today

Why some Europeans resist air conditioning, even amid deadly heat waves – CBS News

Issue No. 2941

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World Health Organization: New WHO plan urges stronger action against fungal disease

Tue, 30 Jun 2026 08:00:00 -0400

The World Health Organization (WHO) has published new guidance to help countries confront the rising burden of fungal disease and antifungal resistance - one of the most neglected global health threats, yet still largely absent from national health plans.

Global Health Now: Global Health NOW: Collapse Upon Collapse in Venezuela; and Human Connection at the Heart of Public Health Change

Mon, 29 Jun 2026 09:38:16 -0400

Global Health NOW: Collapse Upon Collapse in Venezuela; and Human Connection at the Heart of Public Health Change

June 29, 2026

IN FOCUS

People gather outside the Domingo Luciani hospital searching for relatives following twin earthquakes in Caracas, Venezuela, on June 25. Juan Barreto/AFP via Getty.

Collapse Upon Collapse in Venezuela

More than 72 hours after Venezuela’s devastating twin earthquakes, overwhelmed first responders and health workers are improvising and relying on civilian volunteers as the country’s long-deteriorating health system buckles under the country’s deadliest natural disaster in decades, reports NBC.

The latest: ~1,450 people have died, ~3,150 people have been injured, and 12,721 people are displaced, with officials warning that those numbers will rise.

International assistance is accelerating, but many communities continue to rely on volunteers using shovels, ropes, and bare hands for rescue and relief efforts as the window narrows for finding survivors.

Overwhelmed facilities, desperate measures: In hard-hit La Guaira, two of the state’s three public hospitals are out of service, and others across the region are heavily damaged, reports The New York Times (gift link).

Surviving facilities have faced dire shortages of water, electricity, medicines, and both medical and communications equipment.

Makeshift trauma wards have filled with patients lying on benches, IVs held up by tree branches, citizens supplying water and medical supplies, and overflowing morgues, per Bloomberg via Jefferson City News Tribune and another New York Times report (gift link).

Already on the brink: The earthquakes struck a health system long hollowed out by years of economic crisis, underinvestment, and mass emigration of health workers.

“The earthquake didn’t collapse the health system. We already had a collapsed health system,” Janeth Márquez, director of the Venezuela chapter of the Catholic charity Caritas, told The New York Times.

Ongoing health crisis: Physicians warn that the crisis is entering a more critical phase as people trapped for longer periods have arrived with more complex medical needs.

Meanwhile, recovery workers face mounting risks, including contamination from bodies under the rubble and a lack of protective and sanitation gear, reports Merco Press.

GLOBAL HEALTH VOICES

SBCC SUMMIT

Human Connection at the Heart of Public Health Change

In an era of rising misinformation, declining reliance on institutions, and social upheaval driven by climate change, conflict, and AI, how do public health communicators gain trust from their communities?

The age-old, yet revolutionary answer: Sustained human connection.

“Information alone does not change lives. Trust, relationships, and human connections do,” said Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health Dean Keshia Pollack Porter in the opening ceremony of the 2026 International Social and Behavior Change Communication (SBCC) Summit in Panama City last week.

What connection looks like: Instead of a top-down public health messaging approach, the field is shifting toward locally based, community-led strategies that especially look to Indigenous knowledge holders and young voices to craft interventions that reflect the lived realities of the people they are meant to serve.

Cross-discipline connection: Researchers, policymakers, practitioners, and creatives from a wide range of backgrounds must work together to support needed changes.

“No single organization, country, or discipline can solve today’s challenges alone,” said Babafunke Fagbemi, executive director of the Centre for Communication and Social Impact.

To that point: The 2026 summit included participants from 125 countries.

Related, via the Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs:

OPPORTUNITY

QUICK HITS

Thousands of miles from the Strait of Hormuz, the Iran war death toll is rising – The Telegraph

Whereabouts of nearly 300 people with Ebola unknown in DR Congo – The Guardian

Sunset or new dawn? UNAids fights for survival – Geneva Solutions

Three Candidates Vying for Global Fund Leadership in Contentious Race – Health Policy Watch

MAHA feels betrayed after Supreme Court ruling on Monsanto, glyphosate – The Hill

Support builds on the right for prosecuting women who get abortions – The New York Times (gift link)

Explaining inequalities in quality of life: a longitudinal study of health disparities in Norway – Quality of Life Research via Pubmed

Issue No. 2940

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��VR��Ƶ Faculty of Medicine news: Bike infrastructure is expanding in Canada, but access remains uneven

Mon, 29 Jun 2026 08:57:39 -0400

Children and older adults are consistently less likely to live near bike lanes, finds a new study that mapped cycling infrastructure in three Canadian cities over a decade.

The ��VR��Ƶ-led research analyzed census data for Montreal, Vancouver and Victoria. Across all three cities, neighbourhoods with a higher proportion of children (under 15) and older adults (65+) were located farther from cycling infrastructure.

World Health Organization: Global drug use reaches record high as increasingly potent synthetic drugs spread

Fri, 26 Jun 2026 08:00:00 -0400

More people are using drugs than ever before, while synthetic substances are reshaping illicit markets and exposing vulnerable communities to greater health risks, according to the UN World Drug Report 2026, released on Friday.

World Health Organization: Deaths in US immigration custody must be investigated: UN rights chief

Fri, 26 Jun 2026 08:00:00 -0400

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk on Friday called for stronger independent oversight of the United States immigration detention system and investigations into all deaths in US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody.

Global Health Now: Global Health NOW: Mapping Childhood Adversity; and Lithuania’s Doctor Shortage

Thu, 25 Jun 2026 09:55:35 -0400

Global Health NOW: Mapping Childhood Adversity; and Lithuania’s Doctor Shortage

June 25, 2026

IN FOCUS

Volunteer teachers lead morning lessons for children displaced by fighting at a Norwegian Refugee Council-supported school. Tawila, North Darfur, Sudan, February 22. Giles Clarke/Avaaz via Getty

Mapping Childhood Adversity

Millions of children worldwide have their early years shaped by stress, trauma, or abuse. Such adverse childhood experiences, known as ACEs, can have lifelong detrimental effects on physical and mental health—and are associated with premature morbidity and mortality, per an editorial published in The Lancet Public Health.

With such widespread and varied childhood harm, what can be done to improve outcomes as kids grow up?

A new Lancet series seeks to help answer that question by more specifically mapping the global burden of ACEs, and by shining a light on the outsized impact of ACES among young people experiencing homelessness.

Together, the studies provide one of the most comprehensive pictures yet of how childhood adversity shapes health and social outcomes—and what policymakers can do to improve outcomes.

Key findings:

A meta-analysis of the global prevalence of ACEs led by researchers from the University of Calgary drew on 1,000+ studies involving 2.6 million adults across 102 countries. They found ACEs are widespread globally, with emotional abuse the most common experience (28%), followed by parental separation or divorce (24%), emotional neglect (22%), and household substance misuse (22%).
Another review on adversity faced by youth experiencing homelessness led by researchers at Charité – Universitätsmedisin Berlin, found nearly all youth reported at least one ACE, including disproportionate rates of physical abuse (62%) and sexual abuse (27%).

Guiding prevention: Such data must “guide where prevention efforts should focus,” argues an accompanying editorial—from parenting support and mental health services to violence prevention.

For youth experiencing homelessness, researchers call for integrated, trauma-informed models that combine housing, healthcare, social services, and “upstream prevention of child maltreatment,” per another commentary.

Related: Save the date: 2nd Global Ministerial Conference on Ending Violence Against Children – WHO and UNICEF

GLOBAL HEALTH VOICES

HEALTHCARE WORKFORCE

Lithuania’s Doctor Shortage Debate

As Lithuania grapples with a growing doctor shortage in rural areas, lawmakers and doctors are at odds about how best to address the crisis.

Background: By 2032, Lithuania is projected to have a deficit of 269 family doctors, 207 internal medicine doctors, and 146 pediatricians.

Lawmakers’ solution: Parliament has voted to fund 385 medical residencies—with a stipulation: Most doctors who complete the state-funded residency program will be required to work five years in a shortage-affected region.

Doctors’ opposition: Junior doctors plan to challenge the rule in court, calling it overly restrictive and saying it fails to address a more complex question: “Why do doctors choose, or choose not, to work in regional areas?” said Laurynas Maciulevičius, Lithuania’s Junior Doctors Association president.

Other European strategies to address shortages range from financial incentives to expanding career development opportunities, per a 2022 WHO report.

Euronews

ALMOST FRIDAY DIVERSION

Now Hear This

We’ve all encountered our own version of the loudest person in the world: the woman talking on speakerphone on the train; the dad at the youth soccer game who insists that “I’M NOT YELLING!”; or our own baby wailing on a long-haul flight.

But the world’s actual loudest person has officially made himself heard: 58-year-old Australian Joseph McGrail-Bateup has made the Guinness Book of World Records for bellowing the word “now”—sorry, “NOW!!!!”—at the ear- and record-splitting volume of 122.4 decibels. That’s within range of a chainsaw, a jet taking off, and a nearby ambulance siren.

Resounding success: While McGrail-Bateup told the AP you “can’t really practice” for such a feat, it seems like his role of being Canberra’s honorary town crier might have helped a smidge (Just turn your speaker volume down before sampling his jubilant “oyez”).

Still echoing: The previous longstanding record was set in 1994 by a Northern Ireland schoolteacher who, quite understandably, hollered the word “quiet.”

QUICK HITS

The Ebola Outbreak's Central Mystery: Where Did This Virus Come From? – The New York Times (gift link)

Life and death in an Ebola virus disease treatment center – The Lancet

Why are crisis pregnancy centers saying they can 'rule out' ectopic pregnancy? – NPR

Ukraine: The Hidden Battle to Protect Millions from Tuberculosis and Other Deadly Diseases – The Global Fund

Years without fluoridated water show pattern of tooth decay experts warned about– CBC

Pandemic pathogens, dengue, cholera were world’s largest emerging infectious disease burdens from 2000 to 2022 – CIDRAP

Vermont is the first state to ban paraquat, a weed killer linked to Parkinson’s disease – AP

Singing the Shopping List: How Music Can Rewire the Brain After Stroke – Knowable

Issue No. 2399