Public health & disease

From disease eradication efforts to advances in vaccination and maternal health, this archive tracks real progress in public health. Stories here focus on what’s working — policies, interventions, and research that are improving and extending lives around the world.

|matthew t rader Y MzYPOLkXI unsplash, for article on overdose deaths

Overdose deaths in the United States drop for first time in two decades

By / / Good News For Humankind

Overdose deaths in the United States finally reversed course in 2018, ending nearly two decades of almost unbroken annual increases — a sign that the coordinated public health response is starting to work. Expanded naloxone access, medication-assisted treatment, and community outreach all appear to have contributed, though no single intervention gets the credit. The picture inside the data is mixed: while opioid deaths fell, deaths involving cocaine and methamphetamine rose, suggesting the epidemic shifted rather than ended. Still, experts say this is evidence that scaling up treatment saves lives — and that doing so remains the central, unfinished challenge.

Viruses up close

Scientists eliminate HIV in animal genome in historic first

By / / Good news links

Existing HIV treatment used antiretroviral therapy, which is not a cure for HIV and requires lifelong use. In this study, researchers used a gene editing system to remove large fragments of HIV DNA from infected cells, along with a new drug regimen called long-acting slow-effective release. This approach eliminated HIV DNA from about one-third of the mice, marking the first time that HIV had been eradicated from the genomes of living animals.