For how we live.
A 28-year-old technician at a plague research institute in Irkutsk died on 2 October. WHO rates the risk low in Russia and very low in Europe, but has asked Russian authorities to clarify the cause of her pneumonia.
A diagnostic study reports all 12 cat tissues and 11 of 15 rat tissues tested positive, with the highest viral loads in the brain — evidence small mammals may carry avian influenza.
A meta-analysis of 247 studies across 41 countries pooled a 15.3% detection rate, rising to 38% in fish and seafood markets and running highest across South-East Asia.
A new model built on rare donor-transmitted infections estimates China detected 29% and the United States 6% of their rabies deaths, implying hundreds go uncounted each year even where the disease seems rare.
A national analysis of 2020–2025 surveillance found a case fatality rate of 15.5% that never improved, a season tied to heat and rainfall, and a falling share of suspected cases ever confirmed.
The honest position is two things at once: the current risk to the general public is low, and the reason it is watched so closely is that its worst-case potential is high. The gap between the two is the whole story.
A study of 806 suspected cases found nearly a quarter were confirmed Crimean-Congo haemorrhagic fever, all the main risk factors tied to livestock handling — as warming expands the range of the ticks that carry it.
A surveillance analysis of Sistan and Baluchestan finds confirmed and probable cases falling from a 2019 peak, with an 11% fatality rate and a clear winter clustering.
The patient drank raw date palm sap through most of January. Thirty-five contacts are under monitoring, and the six who developed symptoms have tested negative.
WHO was notified on January 26 of the third Nipah outbreak recorded in West Bengal. There is no licensed vaccine or drug, and the source of exposure is still under investigation.
A Washington State adult died on 21 November after infection with an avian influenza subtype never before found in a person. Contact tracing found no onward spread. Europe is having a record autumn bird season.
WHO reports 404 confirmed human cases across the two countries in six weeks. The case fatality ratio is 30% in Mauritania and 7.8% in Senegal — a gap that says more about detection than about the virus.
Three of the four cases drank raw date palm sap in the usual December-April window. The fourth, a child who fell ill in August, did not — and the source remains under investigation.
WHO has logged 11 laboratory-confirmed human A(H5N1) infections in Cambodia between 1 January and 1 July, including six deaths. Every case had handled or culled sick poultry.
Five cutaneous anthrax cases, one fatal, were confirmed in Mukdahan province in May 2025, all tied to the home slaughter of infected cows — a textbook zoonotic spillover.