The World Health Organization warns that global health funding cuts are paving the way for a resurgence of diseases that had been brought to the brink by vaccination.
One example of prior success is Africa’s “meningitis belt”, spanning parts of sub-Saharan Africa, where vaccination campaigns had successfully eliminated meningitis A. Likewise, yellow fever and related deaths were drastically cut by improved routine immunisation and emergency vaccine stockpiles.
The WHO says that this hard-won progress is now threatened. “Funding cuts to global health have put these hard-won gains in jeopardy,” warned Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General.
Outbreaks on the rise
In 2023, measles cases were estimated at more than 10.3 million – a 20% year-on-year increase. In a statement marking the beginning of World Immunization Week,the WHO, UN Children’s Fund UNICEF and their partners warned that this upward trend is expected to continue into 2025.
After years of declining cases in Africa thanks to improved vaccine access, yellow fever is also making a return. The start of 2025 has already seen a rise in outbreaks across the continent, with cases also confirmed in the Americas.
The threat of vaccine misinformation
Vaccination efforts are increasingly under pressure due to a combination of misinformation, population growth, humanitarian crises, and funding cuts.
Earlier this month, a WHO review across 108 countries found that nearly half are experiencing moderate to severe disruptions to vaccination campaigns, routine immunisations, and supply chains due to falling donor support.
“The global funding crisis is severely limiting our ability to vaccinate over 15 million vulnerable children in fragile and conflict-affected countries against measles,” said Catherine Russell, Executive Director of UNICEF.
High healthcare returns on vaccination
Vaccines save around 4.2 million lives each year, protecting against 14 different diseases. Almost half of those lives are saved in Africa.
Despite this, falling investment now risks the re-emergence of diseases once thought to be under control.
Health experts emphasise that immunisation is one of the most cost-effective health interventions. Every $1 invested in vaccines brings an estimated return of $54 through better health and economic productivity.
UNICEF, WHO, and their partners are calling on parents, the public, and political leaders to support immunisation programmes and ensure long-term investment in vaccines and public health systems.
Patients with chronic lymphocytic leukaemia (CLL) or small lymphocytic lymphoma (SLL) who were taking cholesterol-lowering statin medications at the start of their cancer treatment had a 61% lower risk of dying from their cancer compared to similar patients who were not taking statins, according to a study published today in the journal Blood Advances.
“This is the first systematic evaluation of the association of statin use with survival outcomes in patients with CLL or SLL who have been treated with contemporary targeted agents such as ibrutinib,” said the study’s principal investigator, Ahmad Abuhelwa, PhD, an assistant professor of pharmacy practice and pharmacotherapeutics at the University of Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates. “Our results highlight a strong link between statin use and improved survival in this patient population.”
CLL is a slow-growing cancer that starts in the blood-forming cells of the bone marrow and is the most common form of leukaemia in adults in the United States. SLL, also a slow-growing cancer, affects the same type of cells as CLL but starts in lymphoid tissues such as the spleen instead of in the blood-forming cells.
Statins are among the most widely prescribed medications. It’s estimated that over 90 million adults in the United States take a statin drug to reduce their cholesterol levels and lower their risk for heart disease, which can lead to heart attacks or strokes. Previous studies have linked statin use to reduced death rates from several cancers, including CLL, said Dr Abuhelwa. However, those studies did not evaluate the effects of statin use in patients who were treated with newer cancer therapies such as the targeted drug ibrutinib, he said.
In the current study, Dr Abuhelwa and his colleagues analysed data from 1467 patients with CLL or SLL who participated in four international clinical trials conducted between 2012 and 2019. In these trials, patients were randomly assigned to treatment with ibrutinib either alone or in combination with other anti-cancer drugs, or to a drug regimen that did not include ibrutinib. A total of 424 patients (29%) were taking a statin at the time they started treatment across the four clinical trials. The median patient age was 65, and 66% were men; 92% had CLL, which was either newly diagnosed, had come back, or had not responded to prior treatment.
The study’s primary endpoints were cancer-specific survival (how long patients lived after starting treatment before dying specifically from their cancer), overall survival (how long patients lived after starting treatment, regardless of the cause of death), and progression-free survival (how long patients lived after starting treatment before their cancer worsened or they died from any cause). The secondary endpoint was the proportion of patients who experienced severe or life-threatening adverse events. The median follow-up time for all patients enrolled in the four trials was five years for overall survival and 22 months for progression-free survival.
To account for potential confounding factors, the investigators adjusted their analysis for variables including each patient’s diagnosis, age, sex, weight, physical functioning (as assessed by doctors), disease severity, length of time since their diagnosis, number of co-existing illnesses, use of other medications for heart conditions or high blood pressure, and the specific anti-cancer treatment regimen received.
Results showed that, regardless of any of these factors, patients who took a statin had, on average, a 61% reduced risk of dying from their cancer, a 38% reduced risk of death from any cause, and a 26% reduced risk of disease progression. Importantly, statin use did not increase the likelihood of severe or life-threatening adverse events.
“These findings don’t allow us to say for certain that statins directly improve cancer outcomes,” said Dr. Abuhelwa. “However, the fact that this association remained strong even after accounting for multiple factors makes it an important area for future research.” As next steps, he recommended conducting laboratory studies to better understand how statins may influence cancer biology, as well as prospective clinical trials in which patients with CLL or SLL are randomly assigned to take a statin or not.
The study has several limitations given its observational nature. For example, patients enrolled in clinical trials tend to be monitored more closely than those who receive treatment outside of a clinical trial, so the study findings may not be generalizable to patients treated in non-clinical trial settings. Additionally, because patients used various statins at different doses, the study could not determine the effects of specific statin types, doses, or duration of use on patients’ survival.
“While our results are very promising, we can’t recommend starting statins for CLL/SLL treatment based on this study alone,” Dr Abuhelwa said. “Future clinical trials are needed to determine definitively whether statins have a direct benefit on cancer survival.”
Adolescents who sleep for longer – and from an earlier bedtime – than their peers tend to have improved brain function and perform better at cognitive tests, researchers from the UK and China have shown.
But the study of adolescents in the US also showed that even those with better sleeping habits were not reaching the amount of sleep recommended for their age group.
Sleep plays an important role in helping our bodies function. It is thought that while we are asleep, toxins that have built up in our brains are cleared out, and brain connections are consolidated and pruned, enhancing memory, learning, and problem-solving skills. Sleep has also been shown to boost our immune systems and improve our mental health.
During adolescence, our sleep patterns change. We tend to start going to bed later and sleeping less, which affects our body clocks. All of this coincides with a period of important development in our brain function and cognitive development. The American Academy of Sleep Medicine says that the ideal amount of sleep during this period is between eight- and 10-hours’ sleep.
Professor Barbara Sahakian from the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Cambridge said: “Regularly getting a good night’s sleep is important in helping us function properly, but while we know a lot about sleep in adulthood and later life, we know surprisingly little about sleep in adolescence, even though this is a crucial time in our development. How long do young people sleep for, for example, and what impact does this have on their brain function and cognitive performance?”
Studies looking at how much sleep adolescents get usually rely on self-reporting, which can be inaccurate. To get around this, a team led by researchers at Fudan University, Shanghai, and the University of Cambridge turned to data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study, the largest long-term study of brain development and child health in the United States.
As part of the ABCD Study, more than 3200 adolescents aged 11-12 years old had been given FitBits, allowing the researchers to look at objective data on their sleep patterns and to compare it against brain scans and results from cognitive tests. The team double-checked their results against two additional groups of 13-14 years old, totalling around 1190 participants. The results are published today in Cell Reports.
The team found that the adolescents could be divided broadly into one of three groups:
Group One, accounting for around 39% of participants, slept an average (mean) of 7 hours 10 mins. They tended to go to bed and fall asleep the latest and wake up the earliest.
Group Two, accounting for 24% of participants, slept an average of 7 hours 21 mins. They had average levels across all sleep characteristics.
Group Three, accounting for 37% of participants, slept an average of 7 hours 25 mins. They tended to go to bed and fall asleep the earliest and had lower heart rates during sleep.
Although the researchers found no significant differences in school achievement between the groups, when it came to cognitive tests looking at aspects such as vocabulary, reading, problem solving and focus, Group Three performed better than Group Two, which in turn performed better than Group One.
Group Three also had the largest brain volume and best brain functions, with Group One the smallest volume and poorest brain functions.
Professor Sahakian said: “Even though the differences in the amount of sleep that each group got was relatively small, at just over a quarter-of-an-hour between the best and worst sleepers, we could still see differences in brain structure and activity and in how well they did at tasks. This drives home to us just how important it is to have a good night’s sleep at this important time in life.”
First author Dr Qing Ma from Fudan University said: “Although our study can’t answer conclusively whether young people have better brain function and perform better at tests because they sleep better, there are a number of studies that would support this idea. For example, research has shown the benefits of sleep on memory, especially on memory consolidation, which is important for learning.”
The researchers also assessed the participants’ heart rates, finding that Group Three had the lowest heart rates across the sleep states and Group One the highest. Lower heart rates are usually a sign of better health, whereas higher rates often accompany poor sleep quality like restless sleep, frequent awakenings and excessive daytime sleepiness.
Because the ABCD Study is a longitudinal study – that is, one that follows its participants over time – the team was able to show that the differences in sleep patterns, brain structure and function, and cognitive performance, tended be present two years before and two years after the snapshot that they looked at.
Senior author Dr Wei Cheng from Fudan University added: “Given the importance of sleep, we now need to look at why some children go to bed later and sleep less than others. Is it because of playing videogames or smartphones, for example, or is it just that their body clocks do not tell them it’s time to sleep until later?”
The research was supported by the National Key R&D Program of China, National Natural Science Foundation of China, National Postdoctoral Foundation of China and Shanghai Postdoctoral Excellence Program. The ABCD Study is supported by the National Institutes of Health.
Researchers at the University of Oklahoma have made a breakthrough discovery that could potentially revolutionise treatments for antibiotic-resistant infections, cancer and other challenging gram-negative pathogens without relying on precious metals.
Currently, precious metals like platinum and rhodium are used to create synthetic carbohydrates, which are vital components of many approved antibiotics used to combat gram-negative pathogens, including Pseudomonas aeruginosa, a notorious hospital-acquired infection responsible for the deaths of immunocompromised patients. However, these elements require harsh reaction conditions, are expensive to use and are harmful to the environment when mined. In an innovative study published in the journal Nature Communications, an OU team led by Professor Indrajeet Sharma has replaced these precious metals with either blue light or iron, achieving similar results with significantly lower toxicity, reduced costs, and greater appeal for researchers and drug manufacturers.
By using abundant, inexpensive, iron or metal-free, non-toxic blue light, the team can more easily and rapidly synthesize these important carbohydrates. Since most antibiotics rely on a carbohydrate molecule to penetrate the thin, external layer of the gram-negative bacteria, this discovery could transform the way doctors treat multi-drug-resistant pathogens.
“Drug-resistant infections are a major problem and are expected to rise unless something is done,” Sharma said. “By using our methods to make late-stage drug modifications, synthetic carbohydrate-based antibiotics could help treat these infections. Furthermore, since carbohydrates can also increase a drug’s solubility, they can be easily deployed as a pro-drug that a patient can simply take it with water.”
A pro-drug is a medication that it less active when administered and metabolized into its active form. To help drug molecules last longer in the body and work more effectively, Sharma’s team is exploring ways to attach specially designed sugars or unnatural sugar to them. They are using a unique blue light-based method, developed by Surya Pratap Singh, a lead researcher and doctoral student in Dr. Sharma’s lab, that does not require metals.
“If a drug molecule is broken down too quickly, it loses its potency. By replacing an oxygen atom in the carbohydrate molecule with a sulfur one, enzymes in the human body won’t recognise the molecule as a carbohydrate and won’t break it down as quickly,” Sharma said. “These modified compounds, commonly called thiosugars, could be used to more effectively treat infections and diseases like cancer.”
Researchers at Tulane University have identified a potential new way to treat idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), a deadly and currently incurable lung disease that affects more than 3 million people worldwide.
IPF is rapidly progressive and causes scarring in the lungs, making it difficult to breathe. Approximately 50% of patients die within three years of diagnosis, and current treatments can only slow the disease – not stop or reverse it.
In a study published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, Tulane scientists found that an FDA-approved cancer drug may help the immune system clear out the damaged cells that cause the lung scarring, potentially restoring lung function in patients with the disease.
In healthy lungs, specialised cells called fibroblasts help repair lung tissue. But in people with IPF, some fibroblasts and nearby epithelial cells stop functioning properly. These so-called “senescent” cells no longer divide or die as they should. Instead, they build up and contribute to stiff, scarred lungs.
Tulane researchers discovered that these senescent cells appear to accumulate when the immune system’s natural ability to remove them is blocked. The culprit: a protein called CTLA4, which acts as an emergency brake on immune system activity.
By using ipilimumab — an immunotherapy drug currently used to treat various cancers — the researchers were able to block CTLA4 in mice. This released the “brakes” on certain immune cells called T cells, reactivating their ability to clear out the senescent fibroblasts. As a result, the mice showed significantly improved lung tissue regeneration and reduced scarring.
“The CTLA4 protein normally functions to prevent excessive inflammation by blocking overactive T cells,” said senior author Dr. Victor Thannickal, professor and Harry B. Greenberg Chair of Medicine at Tulane University’s John W. Deming Department of Medicine. “Too much of this ‘blocker protein’ may result in losing the ‘good’ inflammation that is needed to remove senescent cells. What we’re doing is blocking the blocker.”
The researchers zeroed in on CTLA4 as a potential therapeutic target when they analyzed both human and mouse IPF lung tissue and found unusually high levels of CTLA4 on the T cells in the areas where scarring was most prevalent.
Mice that received ipilimumab showed significantly improved lung repair ability and recovered faster than mice that did not receive the drug.
“This opens up an entirely new direction for potential treatment of IPF,” said lead author Santu Yadav, PhD, assistant professor of medicine at the Tulane University School of Medicine. “Instead of using drugs to kill senescent cells, we are re-activating our own immune system to clear them out.”
More research is needed to determine the efficacy of drugs that target CTLA4 or other so-called “checkpoint proteins” to rejuvenate the immune system. A primary concern is determining a safe dosing strategy that allows for the immune system to attack senescent cells without causing harmful levels of inflammation.
IPF is a disease of aging and is rarely seen before age 50. These findings also offer hope that this approach could work for other similar aging related diseases.
“If it works in IPF, this immune rejuvenating approach to treatment may be effective in other diseases such as Alzheimer’s or cardiovascular diseases in which senescent cells are known to accumulate,” Thannickal said. “Can the right drug activate T cells in a way that clears senescent cells without causing collateral damage? If so, we may be closer to combating many aging related diseases and perhaps even aging itself.”
