News & Perspective

(CIDRAP News) – Opening the 65th annual World Health Assembly (WHA) today, World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Margaret Chan, MD, said she sees a bright future for health development, despite financial crises that many countries are facing, which has shrunk support for many initiatives.

(CIDRAP News) – Researchers from the United States and Uganda today released the first full scientific report on a new Ebola species that struck western Uganda late last year and was linked to 149 suspected cases and 37 deaths, at least 4 of them healthcare providers.

(CIDRAP News) – A health official in Uganda said yesterday that the Ebola outbreak in the western part of the country is receding, though it's too soon to say the disease has been contained, according to media reports.

(CIDRAP News) – The United Nations today signaled a new level of concern about avian influenza and the risk of a flu pandemic by naming a special coordinator of all UN responses to the situation.

Dr. David Nabarro, a British public health expert with the World Health Organization (WHO), was named to the new job of "UN system coordinator for avian and human influenza."