Global health review
A weekly round-up of all the latest global health research from MSF projects and beyond
07 November 2025
This week, The Lancet estimated that more than 3 million life-years have been lost in Gaza due to over 60,000 deaths explicitly due to actions by the Israeli military. Most life-years lost were among civilians, including over 1 million life-years belonging to children under the age of 15.
In the Journal of Paediatric Gastroenterology and Nutrition, MSF assessed human HIV genotypic resistance among people with virologic failure in Mozambique, finding high dolutegravir (DTG) resistance. The study validated an algorithm that effectively predicted resistance and reduced unnecessary antiretroviral therapy switches in patients who could still benefit from DTG treatment in resource-limited contexts where genotypic testing is scarce.
In Infectious Disease Reports, MSF investigated malnutrition-associated liver damage in children with moderate acute malnutrition in Burkina Faso. Liver function tests were mostly normal, but children with stunted growth had higher bilirubin levels, suggesting potential subclinical liver damage and the need for future studies to include imaging techniques.
Finally, in PLOS Speaking of Medicine and Health, a discussion on the Symposium on Ageing in Crisis highlighted the often-overlooked roles and needs of older people in humanitarian settings. Key actors stressed how structural discrimination and ageism exclude them from protection and services, calling for minimum standards and international frameworks to safeguard their rights.
Best regards,
Zhi Wei Ching, Lydia Lampiri, Madeleine Baxter and Holly Baker with MSF-authored article assistance from Amelia Zhao.
All MSF-authored publications can be found on the MSF Science Portal, as well as recordings, abstracts and posters from the MSF Scientific Days 2024 conference.
Antimicrobial resistance
The BMJ Global Health • Article: An assessment of antimicrobial resistance national action plans and their impact on antibiotic use
The BMJ Global Health • Article: Involvement of community health workers in antimicrobial stewardship interventions and programmes: a scoping review
JAMA • News: One in 6 Common Bacterial Infections Are Resistant to Antibiotics, WHO Warns
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Distribution, epidemiology, and antimicrobial resistance pattern of gram-negative bacteria isolated from blood: A retrospective study in a tertiary care hospital, Dhaka, Bangladesh
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Admission screening for extended-spectrum cephalosporin-resistant and carbapenem-resistant Enterobacterales colonization at a referral hospital in Botswana: A one-year period-prevalence survey, 2022–2023
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Integrating traditional medicine into antimicrobial resistance education: Community-centric preparedness in Zimbabwe
Climate change and Planetary Health
The BMJ • Review: Effects of extreme heat on physiology, morbidity, and mortality under climate change: mechanisms and clinical implications
The BMJ • Opinion: Brazil’s agribusiness industry is contributing to the climate crisis, hunger, and food insecurity
The BMJ • Opinion: International Court of Justice’s ruling on climate change affirms states’ obligations to human and planetary health
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Living through the heat: How urban children and young people experience and envision healthier cities
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: The implementation gap: Cross-sector management of heat-related health risks in Western cape, South Africa
Conflict, migration and health
The Lancet • Correspondence: Over 3 million life-years lost in Gaza
The BMJ • Opinion: Medicine’s reckoning with genocide and crimes against humanity
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: A systematic review of qualitative research on the physical and mental health impacts of immigration detention on asylum seekers and refugees
PLOS Speaking of Medicine and Health • Blog***MSF AUTHOR***: Symposium on ageing in crisis: Advancing the overlooked healthcare rights and needs of older people in humanitarian crises
Global health
The Lancet Infectious Disease • other: The social and political drivers behind pandemics
The Lancet Primary Care • Correspondence: Primary care as a transformative force for equity: lessons from Brazil
The BMJ Global Health • Comment: Strengthening primary health care in Nigeria: a means to achieve universal health coverage
The BMJ Global Health • Comment: How should morality play a role in global health?
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Disinvesting in the future leadership of global health has already begun: What can we do about it?
HIV
The Lancet HIV • Feature: Africa's ageing HIV epidemic
The Lancet HIV • Viewpoint: Artificial intelligence in HIV research, policy, and clinical care
The BMJ • News: A&E hepatitis and HIV testing programme identifies thousands of undiagnosed cases
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Stakeholder considerations on acceptability and implementation of a novel rapid test for acute HIV infection: A qualitative study in Indiana
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Evaluation of the SKILLZ intervention to promote HIV testing and contraception uptake in adolescent girls in Lusaka, Zambia: A cluster-randomized trial
PLOS Medicine • Article: Differences in growth trajectories in breastfed HIV-exposed uninfected and HIV-unexposed infants in Kenya: An observational cohort study
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Prognostic model of HIV-associated talaromycosis in south China: A large-scale retrospective study
Journal of Paediatric Gastroenterology and Nutrition • Article***MSF AUTHOR***: Dolutegravir Resistance in Mozambique: Insights from a Programmatic HIV Resistance Testing Intervention in a Highly Antiretroviral Therapy-Experienced Cohort
Infectious diseases
The Lancet Infectious Disease • Article: Oral itraconazole versus oral voriconazole for treatment-naive patients with chronic pulmonary aspergillosis in India (VICTOR-CPA trial): a single-centre, open-label, randomised, controlled, superiority trial
The BMJ • News: Are deadly mosquitoes, pathogen laden ticks, and waterborne infections being brought to the UK by climate change?
JAMA • Comment: Screening for Hepatitis C in Emergency Departments
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: “It would be better for those of us who have the disease not to be ashamed”: Insights from people living with chronic hepatitis B virus infection and healthcare workers providing HBV care in Kilifi, Kenya
Malaria
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: First field evaluation of novel LDH- and HRP2-based rapid tests for Plasmodium vivax and Plasmodium falciparum malaria diagnosis
Transactions RSTMH • Article: Detection of subpatent malaria among febrile mobile and migratory population individuals: a strategy for malaria elimination
Malaria Journal • Article: Effect of corticosteroids on haemoglobinuria resolution among children with blackwater fever at Soroti regional referral hospital, Uganda: a retrospective cohort study
Malaria Journal • Article: Haemoproteus syrnii and other haemosporidians infecting owls from North America
Malaria Journal • Article: Coustani Group mosquito (Diptera: Culicidae) diversity and malaria transmission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo
Malaria Journal • Article: Clinical evaluation of a novel Mologic malaria Plasmodium falciparum LDH-dependent lateral flow rapid diagnostic test diagnostic accuracy: a cross-sectional study, Sudan
Malaria Journal • Article: Timing is everything: a simple chemical method to determine the bioavailable surface concentration of insecticide for insecticide-treated net evaluation
Maternal and child health
The Lancet Global Health • Article: Effect of maternity care improvement, fertility decline, and contraceptive use on global maternal mortality reduction between 2000 and 2023: results from a decomposition analysis
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Beyond facility-based births: Is Uganda delivering effective maternal and newborn care? An analysis of the 2022 demographic health survey and 2023 harmonized health facility assessment survey
Infectious Disease Reports • Article***MSF AUTHOR***: Liver function tests among children with moderate acute malnutrition: A secondary analysis of a randomized trial from Burkina Faso
Mental health
Conflict & Health • Article: Mental health literacy among populations in and from war and armed conflict zones: a narrative review
Neglected tropical diseases
The Lancet Infectious Disease • other: Safe delivery of intensive care for Marburg virus disease in Rwanda
The Lancet Regional Health Americas • Article: Socioeconomic disparities and dog rabies: a retrospective analysis of high-spatial-resolution surveillance data from a Latin American city
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Assessment of vector control strategies based on mass Aedes (Stegomyia) mosquito trapping (AGOs traps) pilot study in a US-Mexico border region of South Texas
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Translesion synthesis and microhomology-mediated end-joining repair in trypanosomatids
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Engineered Nanobodies for early and accurate diagnosis of dengue virus infection
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: A Trichinella spiralis serine protease triggers gut epithelial apoptosis and destroys the barrier integrity to mediate larval invasion
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Hantavirus infections and small mammal diversity in Chile: No differences between protected and unprotected areas highlight the need for public health strategies
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Trends in the global burden of cystic echinococcosis among children and adolescents from 1990 to 2021: An analysis based on the Global Burden of Disease Study 2021
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Hidden threats in urban environments: Angiostrongylus cantonensis in Banda Aceh’s cityscape
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: ADAMTS13 in Bothrops lanceolatus snakebite envenoming: Crude venom-induced reduction of in vitro enzymatic activity and clinical correlation in snakebite patients
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Prevalence and risk factors of scabies among orphans: A cross-sectional study in Bangladesh
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Spatio-temporal distribution and environmental determinants of dengue vectors in Phnom Penh, Cambodia
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Epidemiologic features and potential year of life lost of scrub typhus in China: A nationwide surveillance analysis (2006– 2023)
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Adjuvant hyperbaric oxygen therapy reduces the duration of sporotrichosis treatment
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Antibody response to Aedes aegypti D7L1 + 2 salivary proteins as marker of aggregate vector exposure and correlate of dengue virus susceptibility
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Rhesus macaques model human Mayaro virus disease and transmit to Aedes aegypti mosquitoes
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Neglected brucellosis in pediatric populations from non-endemic regions: Clinical manifestations and prediction of severe disease in Yunnan Province, China
Tropical Medicine and International Health • Article: Evaluation of Midwife-Led Colposcopy for Female Genital Schistosomiasis Screening at Primary Level of Care in Rural Madagascar: A Cross-Sectional Study
Transactions RSTMH • Article: Prevalence of schistosomiasis and soil-transmitted helminths in school children in Kpone Katamanso Municipality, Greater Accra, Ghana: a cross-sectional study
Transactions RSTMH • Article: Low CD4+ T-cell count and haematological parameters in patients with cutaneous leishmaniasis, Northwest Ethiopia: a cross-sectional study
Transactions RSTMH • other: T-cell depletion and oral candidiasis in Kyasanur Forest disease: a case series
Transactions RSTMH • Review: One Health best practices for addressing health threats at the human–animal–environment interface, with focus on the Eastern Mediterranean Region
Transactions RSTMH • Article: Exploring the role of onchocerciasis in epilepsy: insights from a mouse model study
Transactions RSTMH • Article: Elimination is not the end: experience in handling the last residual filariasis focus in China
Non-communicable diseases
The Lancet Primary Care • Article: Costs and coverage of community health worker-led hypertension and diabetes screening in rural Lesotho (ComBaCaL): cost–consequence analysis of a cohort study
The Lancet Primary Care • Comment: Benefits and limitations of rigorous cost analyses in community health
Outbreaks
The Lancet • Correspondence: Simultaneous outbreaks of Ebola, cholera, mpox, and measles in DR Congo in 2025
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Harnessing traditional healers role in strengthening Africa’s public health response: A case study of Mpox outbreak
Sexual and reproductive health
The BMJ Global Health • Comment: Obstetrician and gynaecologist engagement in global surgery: adding necessary value to the field
The BMJ Global Health • Article: Effectiveness of a clinic-based counselling intervention on risk of experiencing intimate partner violence and reproductive coercion: a matched-pair cluster-controlled trial in Ebonyi and Sokoto, Nigeria
The BMJ Global Health • Article: Diagnostic accuracy of a simplified minimally invasive tissue sampling protocol for stillbirths in low-resource settings
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Contraceptive discontinuation, switching, abandonment and their reproductive consequences: An analysis of 1,539,071 episodes of reversible method use contributed from 61 countries that participated in DHS: Population base-analysis
Tuberculosis
The Lancet Infectious Disease • Comment: Tuberculosis and undernutrition: improving estimates to reinforce the policy imperative
The Lancet Infectious Disease • Article: Integrating metagenomic sequencing into diagnostic pathways for tuberculous meningitis
The Lancet Infectious Disease • Comment: Integrating metagenomic sequencing into diagnostic pathways for tuberculous meningitis – Authors' reply
The Lancet Respiratory Medicine • other: Climate change and tuberculosis: an analytical framework
The BMJ Global Health • Article: Community-based mobile tuberculosis clinics in rural Madagascar: impact and cost-effectiveness analysis
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Mortality disparities among children and adolescents with tuberculosis in Tanzania Mainland from January 2023 to December 2023: A retrospective cohort study
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Active case-finding for TB in India: Assessment of scale and quality benchmarks, time taken and use of rapid molecular diagnostic tests
PLOS Global Public Health • Article: Early cost-effectiveness analysis of a novel rapid diagnostic test for tuberculosis in rural Philippine settings
Vaccines
The Lancet Infectious Disease • Article: Vaccine effectiveness of a bivalent respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) pre-F vaccine against RSV-associated hospital admission among adults aged 75–79 years in England: a multicentre, test-negative, case–control study
The Lancet Infectious Disease • Comment: More real-world evidence for RSV vaccines in the global community
The BMJ • Feature: Seth Berkley interview: vaccination in a time of extreme scepticism
PLOS Global Public Health • Opinion: Strengthening vaccine effectiveness research to rebuild public trust: A call for global participation
Zika
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases • Article: Natural salivary gland barrier curtails Zika virus transmission in Thai Aedes aegypti