Pennsylvania has experienced a surge in measles cases, totaling 1,078 so far in 2026, making it the largest outbreak in the US since 1991. The majority of cases have emerged since April, with 207 hospitalizations and five deaths, all among unvaccinated individuals. The outbreak continues to grow, with 34 new cases reported since Monday, and experts are now questioning whether the US has lost its measles elimination status.
arstechnica.com
· 2026-10-07
An Ebola outbreak caused by the rare Bundibugyo virus was declared in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uganda on 15 May, with cases in the DRC reaching 7,890 and deaths around 3,799 by 23 September, a fatality rate near 48%. No licensed vaccine or treatment exists for this viral species, though two candidate vaccines and several experimental drugs are in clinical trials. Richard Kojan, an intensive-care physician with ALIMA, has been treating patients at treatment centres in the DRC, where symptoms mirror the more lethal Zaire Ebola species and many patients die of multi-organ failure after arriving in shock.
nature.com
· 2026-10-07
A researcher at Russia's Irkutsk Anti-Plague Institute died of unexplained severe pneumonia after reportedly breaking a test tube, prompting quarantine of the treating hospital and isolation of her coworkers. The CDC said the case's circumstances remain unconfirmed and there's no sign of broader threat to the US, while the WHO said it has contacted Russian authorities and assesses public health risk as very low.
wired.com
· 2026-10-06
Sierra Nevada Cheese Company has stopped making and shipping all Graziers Raw Milk Cheese products as health officials investigate an E. coli outbreak linked to the cheeses. Thirteen people have fallen ill, with eight requiring hospitalization, prompting a nationwide recall of the affected products.
fastcompany.com
· 2026-10-01
UPMC's community hospital in Lititz, Pennsylvania has evaluated about 50 measles patients since April, with roughly 20 requiring hospitalization, according to infectious disease specialist John Goldman. Statewide, Pennsylvania has logged 943 cases, 176 hospitalizations and five deaths as of September 30, part of a national measles resurgence topping 3,600 cases this year, the highest since 1991.
wired.com
· 2026-10-01
Pennsylvania's health department confirmed a fifth death from measles, an unvaccinated Lancaster County resident, as the state's outbreak grew to 943 cases across 39 counties. At least 176 people have been hospitalized, with 119 new cases reported in the past week alone. All five deaths this year—two infants, an 18-year-old, a 40-year-old woman, and this latest case—were unvaccinated, and no measles deaths had occurred in the state in the previous 35 years.
arstechnica.com
· 2026-09-30
Taco Bell's per-location traffic finished down 12.2% year over year from July 6 through Sept. 11, the period spanning the cyclospora outbreak tied to Taylor Farms iceberg lettuce, according to Placer.ai data. The chain had pulled lettuce, cilantro-onion mix and pico de gallo and rolled out $1 promotions on Enchiritos and Mexican Pizzas, but traffic had swung from -18.1% to -30.9% versus its own earlier averages before recovering somewhat.
entrepreneur.com
· 2026-09-23
Measles case counts in the United States have surpassed 3,500 so far this year, already exceeding the full-year total recorded in 2025. Health officials note that roughly 10% of this year's cases were reported within just the past two weeks, indicating the outbreak's pace is accelerating rather than slowing.
fastcompany.com
· 2026-09-23
CEPI, a nonprofit focused on epidemic preparedness, says the Bundibugyo Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo has infected more than 7,000 people since May, with roughly half dying, per WHO-compiled government data. The group shifted $100 million to fund vaccine development, including doses from the Serum Institute of India based on Oxford's ChAdOx1 BDBV candidate, alongside a Moderna candidate, both now in safety trials with efficacy trials expected this month.
wired.com
· 2026-09-23
Researchers analyzed geolocated outbreak data for 32 environmentally linked emerging infectious diseases, combining these with global datasets on socio-environmental factors such as land use, climate and biodiversity. Using disease-specific driver hypotheses developed with experts across virology, ecology and public health, they built geospatial statistical models to identify common human-caused patterns behind where outbreaks occur.
nature.com
· 2026-09-23
Chipotle has built a 'food safety risk platform' running on Palantir's Foundry software that combines health department scores, pest incidents, and employee illness reports to generate a risk score for each restaurant location. A Chipotle spokesperson confirmed the project but offered no details on its rollout or timeline, and Palantir has not commented.
wired.com
· 2026-09-16
Researchers describe Delphy, a phylogenetics tool that encodes evolutionary trees as timed nodes carrying explicit mutation and 'missation' (missing-data) annotations relative to a reference sequence. This design lets the software efficiently reconstruct full sequences at any tree point and handle uncertain tip collection dates, aiming to make Bayesian phylogenetic analysis fast enough for near-real-time outbreak response.
nature.com
· 2026-09-16
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