Investigators in Bangladesh have detected the country’s first Zika virus cluster, which occurred in Dhaka, the country’s capital, according to study findings reported yesterday by the country’s International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (ICCDR,B). The study was based on screening in 2023 of 154 patients from Dhaka who had fever or other Zika virus symptoms. The virus was present in five samples, which the team said should prompt wider screening to gauge the true burden of the Zika virus in the country. All five patients lived within 1 km of each other and had not traveled outside the country. One was co-infected with the dengue virus. Genetic sequencing determined that the viruses belonged to the Asian clade, which has been linked to microcephaly and other neurological complications.
The Department of Health and Human Services is evaluating a $590 million contract to Moderna to develop and test mRNA vaccines against pandemic flu threats, including H5N1, Stat reported today, based on a confirmation from the HHS’s communication director.
The development was first reported by Bloomberg News. The contract from the HHS Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) was made in January on one of the final days of the Biden administration.
Four countries reported new polio cases last week, including Pakistan, which reported another wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) case, a patient from Sindh province whose paralysis symptoms began on February 6, according to the latest weekly update from the Global Polio Eradication Initiative. The country, one of two where WPV1 is still endemic, has now recorded three cases for 2025. Elsewhere, Chad (6), Ethiopia (5), and Yemen (2) reported more circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 (cVDPV2) cases, all of which had onsets in 2024 and are included in case totals for the previous year. In other developments, three European countries reported more environmental detections of cVDPV2, most involving samples collected this year.
