Can monkeypox be contained?

It was only nine weeks ago that the U.K. reported four monkeypox cases among men who have sex with men. That number has now soared to nearly 13,000 cases in more than 60 countries. The growth in cases and the geographic spread has been rapid and relentless, STAT’s Helen Branswell reports, so she asked health experts if they think this unprecedented outbreak can be contained.

Most said probably not. “I think we missed that train at this point,” Gary Kobinger of the University of Texas Medical Branch told her. But CDC Director Rochelle Walensky thinks it’s still possible to stop transmission in the population of men who have sex with men. “I am so not giving up yet,” said Walensky, who described herself as someone who is in general “pretty optimistic” but not “an eternal optimist.” Read more.

Facebook allows ads for potentially dangerous ‘abortion reversal’

Facebook is serving up ads and posts for the “abortion pill reversal” procedure, a medically unapproved and potentially dangerous process that the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists says is “not based on science,” The Markup has found. Facebook has been circulating this content for years, a practice lawmakers and anti-disinformation advocates have publicly criticized.

It’s especially controversial now as interest in medication abortion has spiked with the recent decision overturning Roe v. Wade and resulting physical clinic closures, according to a report STAT is co-publishing with The Markup, a nonprofit newsroom that investigates how powerful institutions are using technology to change our society. The ads appear to address people who have just begun the two-step process of a medication abortion, encouraging them to skip the second half and instead flood their bodies with progesterone to halt the process. Facebook parent Meta did not reply to multiple requests for comment.

Fauci charts his exit plan

Anthony Fauci, President Biden’s chief medical adviser and the face of Covid pandemic response, told Politico he’ll leave his positions in federal government by the end of Biden’s term. Now 81, he first became director of NIAID during a different crisis — the HIV/AIDS epidemic — but his more recent tenure is defined by Covid. Here's the money quote: “If somebody says, ‘You'll leave when we don’t have Covid anymore,’ then I will be 105,” he said. “I think we’re going to be living with this.”

That statement is a concession that we never flattened the curve of cases and we’re instead living with the virus and its variants. After 50 years of federal service under seven presidents, he calls establishing the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR, with President George W. Bush, the most impactful thing he’s done.

Closer look: Extreme heat heightens risk for people with chronic conditions

(Brandon Bell/Getty Images)

Temperatures across the U.S. and the world are soaring, in repeated extreme heat waves now more common with climate change. And the dangers from extreme temperatures go beyond immediate dehydration, heat exhaustion, or heat stroke, STAT’s Isabella Cueto reports. Extreme heat holds special risk for people with chronic diseases, including long Covid — and that's a lot of us. Exposure to heat can cause long-term damage and increase the likelihood of kidney disease or respiratory diseases.

Hot days also worsen mental health and increase the odds of being injured at work, or having a heart attack or an infection. Heat can set off flare-ups in a vast array of chronic health conditions, from migraine and rosacea, to lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, asthma, chronic kidney disease, hypertension, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular disease. And many people don’t realize how vulnerable they are. Read more.

At-home treatment for vitiligo gains FDA approval

Patients with vitiligo now have another option for treatment. Yesterday the FDA approved the first at-home therapy for the autoimmune disorder, whose white spots are signs of depigmentation that affect an estimated 0.5% to 2% of the world’s population. In two duplicate Phase 3 clinical trials, Incyte’s ruxolitinib cream, to be sold as Opzelura, helped 30% of patients using the cream regain 75% or more skin repigmentation on the face; roughly 20% of patients regained at least 50% or more repigmentation on their body after 24 weeks.

Vitiligo patients’ treatment choices had been limited to light therapies administered in a doctor’s office. The drug works by quelling patients’ overactive immune systems. Once the immune cells are inhibited, new melanocytes are able to grow into the area and, slowly, the pigment returns to patients’ skin. STAT’s Elissa Welle has more.

Baby talk sounds universal across cultures

You know it when you hear it, even when it’s not in your own language. A new study in Nature Human Behaviour tells us that baby talk and lullabies are universally recognizable across cultures. It turns out that when we sing or speak to babies, we adjust our voices in similar ways, possibly owing to a common evolution. To reach this conclusion, scientists recorded more than 1,600 samples of speech and song from 21 societies on six continents.

Computational analysis teased out differences between vocalizations intended for children versus adults. We use purer timbres, more subdued songs, and higher-pitched words when infants are our audience. When the researchers asked more than 51,000 people from 187 countries to guess when these vocalizations were aimed at infants, their intuitions were right more than expected by chance, suggesting a consistency and function across cultures.

What to read around the web today

This biotech is betting dietary changes can reshape cancer care. Even if it works, can Faeth make a profit?, STAT
World Health Organization declares Marburg outbreak in Ghana, Associated Press
A debilitating illness, often ignored, New York Times
Analysis: Years of neglect leaves sexual health clinics ill-prepared for monkeypox, Reuters
Conservative blocs unleash litigation to curb public health powers,
Kaiser Health News
Contract research organization to transfer 4,000 beagles from facility cited for inhumane care, STAT