Global health review
A weekly round-up of all the latest global health research from MSF projects and beyond
7 February 2025
This week in New England Journal of Medicine, MSF and Epicentre reported findings from the endTB trial, which evaluated the safety and efficacy of five 9-month regimens for rifampin-resistant TB (RR-TB), using newer (bedaquiline, delamanid) and repurposed (clofazimine, linezolid) drugs. Three of the regimens proved as effective as standard treatment, offering simpler, shorter, and safer alternatives while reducing side effects, drug interactions, and resistance risks. In The Lancet Global Health, MSF conducted the first within-trial cost-utility analysis of 6-month BPaL-based regimens (bedaquiline, pretomanid, and linezolid) for RR-TB. The findings suggest that adopting BPaL in high TB-burden countries could cut costs for both providers and patients, enhance treatment, reduce pill burden, and free up critical resources within health systems.
In The European Society of Medicine, Epicentre reported that Omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5 were associated with the onset of Cameroon’s fifth COVID-19 wave, underscoring the need for investment in African genomic surveillance infrastructure and international collaboration to track emerging variants. A comment in The Lancet reported that mpox is causing concurrent outbreaks in Africa with DR Congo bearing the highest global burden. Efforts for inclusive vaccination strategies are hindered by limited funding and inequitable distribution. In The Lancet Infectious Diseases, a multicountry survey found that mpox vaccine hesitancy is associated with an absence of immunisation coverage for other vaccines. This calls attention to addressing access and structural barriers - hesitancy can only arise when vaccines are readily available.
Finally, The Lancet reported on MSF’s decision to dismantle its Access Campaign, a unit established to challenge policy, legal, and political barriers that prevent access to health tools in communities where MSF work and beyond. In the same journal, a correspondence argued against the suggestion that MSF does not function to change the global pharmaceutical industry, and that MSF’s moral legitimacy is not defined by legal frameworks but by a commitment to universal distributive justice.
Best regards,
Zhi Wei Ching, Lydia Lampiri, Madeleine Baxter and Holly Baker with MSF-authored article assistance from Amelia Zhao.
All MSF-authored publications can be found on the MSF Science Portal, as well as recordings, abstracts and posters from the MSF Scientific Days 2024 conference.
Antimicrobial resistance
The Lancet Infectious Diseases • Viewpoint : Sustainable antimicrobial resistance surveillance: time for a global funding mechanism
Tropical Medicine & International Health • Review: Antibiotic resistance in Indonesia: A systematic review and meta-analysis of extended-spectrum beta-lactamase-producing bacteria (2008–2024)
Climate change and Planetary Health
The Lancet Global Health • Comment : The climate crisis and human health: identifying grand challenges through participatory research
The Lancet Planetary Health • Article: Associations between weather extremes and faecal contamination along pathogen transmission pathways in rural Bangladeshi households: a prospective observational study
PLOS Medicine • Article: Long-term drought and risk of infant mortality in Africa: A cross-sectional study
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: A framework for managing infectious diseases in rural areas in low- and middle-income countries in the face of climate change—East Africa as a case study
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Development and implementation of an electronic health record system for use in humanitarian emergencies, disaster response, and conflict zones
Conflict, migration and health
Conflict and Health • Article: Social determinants of student mental health before and after the Beirut port explosion: two cross-sectional studies
Conflict and Health • Article: Evaluation of a peer support group programme for vulnerable host population and refugees living with diabetes and/or hypertension in Lebanon: a before-after study
Conflict and Health • Article: A descriptive analysis of a medical humanitarian aid initiative for quality perinatal management in war-torn Ukraine
The Lancet Respiratory Medicine • News: Health care in Ukraine: If everybody leaves, who will stay?
PLOS Mental Health • Article: Fleeing the war: A socio-ecological perspective on the mental health of internally displaced and refugee children and adolescents living in the Kurdistan region of Iraq
Global health
The Lancet • Correspondence: Global South leaders should strengthen strategic capacity
The Lancet Global Health • Comment : The era of no review: an appraisal on transparency in global health funding
BMC Global and Public Health • Article: Performance-based financing is not on the path towards universal health coverage and equity
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Do global health networks facilitate innovation, learning and sharing? A qualitative analysis of the Quality-of-Care Network in Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Malawi, and Uganda
Springer Nature Link • Article: Evaluation of mobile clinics by MSF in pastoralist community in Doolo Zone, Somali region, Ethiopia
HIV
The Lancet Global Health • Article : Causes of HIV-related CNS infection in Cameroon, Malawi, and Tanzania: epidemiological findings from the DREAMM HIV-related CNS implementation study
The Lancet Global Health • Comment : The need for epidemiological data on HIV-related CNS infections in low-income and middle-income settings
The Lancet HIV • Editorial: Bleak prospects for HIV response under new US administration
Infectious diseases
The Lancet • Comment: Rising mpox trends in DR Congo: the neglected spread of an epidemic
The Lancet • Perspectives: Preparing for the next pandemic
The Lancet • Article: Suspected and confirmed mpox cases in DR Congo: a retrospective analysis of national epidemiological and laboratory surveillance data, 2010–23
The Lancet • Correspondence: Polio in Sudan and other conflict zones: a call for urgent support
The Lancet Global Health • Comment : Africa's mpox strategic preparedness and response plan: a coordinated continental effort to boost health security
The Lancet Global Health • Comment : Harnessing the power of multicountry networks for influenza vaccine monitoring
The Lancet Infectious Diseases • Editorial : Vaccination in Africa—no hesitancy without access
The Lancet Infectious Diseases • Article : Re-emergence of Oropouche virus between 2023 and 2024 in Brazil: an observational epidemiological study
The Lancet Infectious Diseases • Article : Newborns with microcephaly in Brazil and potential vertical transmission of Oropouche virus: a case series
BMJ Global Health • Article: Decoding mpox: a systematic review and meta-analysis of the transmission and severity parameters of the 2022–2023 global outbreak
NEJM • Article: Evolving Epidemiology of Mpox in Africa in 2024
The Lancet HIV • Article: Effect of a multicomponent, person-centred care intervention on client experience and HIV treatment outcomes in Zambia: a stepped-wedge, cluster-randomised trial
The Lancet Respiratory Medicine • Comment: 5 years of COVID-19: equity must lead the next pandemic response in a fractured multipolar world
The Lancet Regional Health Southeast Asia • Correspondence: Why the STD/MSM labelling of mpox could backfire and set back global containment efforts?
The Lancet Regional Health Southeast Asia • Article: Cost-effectiveness of integrated maternal HIV, syphilis, and hepatitis B screening opt-out strategies in Nepal: a modelling study
The European Society of Medicine • Article: Initial detection of SARS-CoV-2 Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 sub variants associated with the onset of the fifth wave of COVID-19 in Cameroon between December 2021 and June 2022: phylogenetic and whole genome analysis
Malaria
Malaria Journal • Article: Voices from the Amazon: exploring implementor and user perceptions of non-invasive malaria diagnostics in Peru
Malaria Journal • Article: Increasing the resolution of malaria early warning systems for use by local health actors
Malaria Journal • Article: Quantifying the potential value of entomological data collection for programmatic decision-making on malaria control in sub-Saharan African settings
Maternal and child health
The Lancet Child and Adolescent Health • Profile: Patricia Young: advocating for children in humanitarian crises
The Lancet Global Health • Article : Prevalence, aetiology, and hospital outcomes of paediatric acute critical illness in resource-constrained settings (Global PARITY): a multicentre, international, point prevalence and prospective cohort study
The Lancet Global Health • Article : Early detection and a treatment bundle strategy for postpartum haemorrhage: a mixed-methods process evaluation
The Lancet Global Health • Article : The effects of prenatal multiple micronutrient supplementation and small-quantity lipid-based nutrient supplementation on small vulnerable newborn types in low-income and middle-income countries: a meta-analysis of individual participant data
The Lancet Global Health • Article : Automated oxygen control for preterm infants receiving continuous positive airway pressure in southwest Nigeria: an open-label, randomised, crossover trial
The Lancet Global Health • Article : Contextual factors influencing bubble continuous positive airway pressure implementation for paediatric respiratory distress in low-income and middle-income countries: a realist review
The Lancet Global Health • Article : The prevalence of hypoxaemia in paediatric and adult patients in health-care facilities in low-income and middle-income countries: a systematic review and meta-analysis
The Lancet Global Health • Comment : Care for chidren with critical illness: a global public health need
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Determinants of Adverse Perinatal Outcomes in Ibadan, Nigeria: The influence of maternal lifestyle
Tropical Medicine & International Health • Article: The neonatal mortality risk of vulnerable newborns in rural Bangladesh: A prospective cohort study within the Shonjibon trial
Mental Health
The Lancet Child and Adolescent Health • Correspondence: Evaluating care quality and appropriateness when promoting health-care seeking for children
PLOS Mental Health • Article: Prevalence and socio-demographic correlates of probable depression and anxiety symptoms in Mozambique: A secondary data analysis
Neglected tropical diseases
The Lancet Global Health • Editorial : Climate change and NTDs: a perfect storm
The Lancet Infectious Diseases • Review : New WHO guidelines for treating rhodesiense human African trypanosomiasis: expanded indications for fexinidazole and pentamidine
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Concurrent transmission of Zika virus during the 2023 dengue outbreak in Dhaka, Bangladesh
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Case-area targeted interventions and free chlorine residual in household drinking water: An observational cohort study during a cholera outbreak in Northeast Nigeria
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: The Neglected Tropical Disease Non-Governmental Organization Network: The role of a global health network in an evolving global health landscape
PLOS blog: ‘Speaking of Medicine and Health’ • Blog: Treating the Cause, Not Just the Symptom: The GLP-1 Access Debate
Non-communicable diseases
The Lancet • World Report: Trump's anticipated UNFPA defunding will harm millions
Sexual and reproductive health
The Lancet • World Report: Trump's anticipated UNFPA defunding will harm millions
Tuberculosis
The Lancet Child and Adolescent Health • Comment: Timeliness and value of individual participant data meta-analyses in paediatric tuberculosis research
The Lancet Infectious Diseases • Article : Sequential and parallel testing for microbiological confirmation of tuberculosis disease in children in five low-income and middle-income countries: a secondary analysis of the RaPaed-TB study
The Lancet Infectious Diseases • Comment: Difficulties in diagnosing tuberculosis infection in childhood
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Treatment outcomes among children and adolescents with extensively drug–resistant (XDR) and pre–XDR tuberculosis: Systematic review and meta–analysis
The Lancet Global Health • Article: 24-week, all-oral regimens for pulmonary rifampicin-resistant tuberculosis in TB-PRACTECAL trial sites: an economic evaluation
The New England Journal Of Medicine • Article: Oral Regimens for Rifampin-Resistant, Fluoroquinolone-Susceptible Tuberculosis
Vaccines
The Lancet • Correspondence: Nepal set to launch historic HPV vaccination programme
The Lancet Global Health • Article : Durability of immunogenicity at 5 years after a single dose of human papillomavirus vaccine compared with two doses in Tanzanian girls aged 9–14 years: results of the long-term extension of the DoRIS randomised trial
BMJ Global Health • Article: Implications of conflict on vaccination in the Sahel region
The Lancet Regional Health Southeast Asia • Article: Small-area variation in child under-vaccination in India: a multilevel analysis of cross-sectional data from 36 states and Union Territories, 707 districts, and 22,349 small-area clusters