Nurith Aizenman

Questioning if fish bay at the moon could lead to ways to protect the ocean's damaged ecosystems. (Story first aired on All Things Considered on June 15, 2023.)

The World Health Organization has lifted the Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) for COVID-19. The declaration had been in effect since Jan. 30, 2020.

The World Health Organization registry holds 11 million data points — key to addressing global health inequality. Yet health officials stress how much information is still missing.

Tuberculosis kills 1.6 million a year — the second deadliest infectious disease after COVID-19. Using immune cells and mRNA technology, scientists in South Africa are working on a new vaccine.

That's the view of Joseph Glauber of the International Food Policy Research Institute. He considers the fear the war would lead to a surge in food prices – and a dramatic worsening of world hunger.

The mRNA shots against COVID were a game-changer but the shots need ultra-cold freezers that are unavailable in many low-income countries. Now the hunt is on for innovations to solve this problem.

Disease researchers from South Africa were the first to identify the omicron variant of the COVID-19 virus. Scientists there are racing to detect new pathogens before they can spark another pandemic.

Only one company makes the currently used monkeypox vaccine. Supply is limited in wealthy nations like the U.S. Less well-off nations, like Nigeria, where the outbreak began, have no vaccines at all.

How Sotiris Missailidis, head of R&D in Brazil's vaccine agency, used the COVID crisis to push through a game-changing effort for middle-income countries to invent their own mRNA vaccine.

Both countries are huge suppliers of grains and other essential foods. And with widespread hunger and high food prices already, the war couldn't have come at a worse time.