Colorado, North Dakota see uptick in measles activity

News brief

Two states are reporting increased measles activity in recent days, with officials in Colorado warning that exposures at a high school could mean more cases are likely and North Dakota adding two cases to its total.

There are four new Colorado measles cases, raising the state total so far this year to eight cases. The new cases are in Adams and Weld counties, and all four people were unvaccinated and had connections to Broomfield High School or Broomfield Heights Middle School.

North Dakota has three new cases, according to media and state updates. NPR said two new cases confirmed March 6 lift the state’s total to 23, while the North Dakota Department of Health & Human Services lists 24 total cases so far in 2026, three of them new.

Utah notes 120 emergency department visits

In Utah, health officials are warning that measles patients are suffering from anemia and liver inflammation.

At a news briefing late last week, Utah State Epidemiologist Leisha Nolen, MD, said she’s hearing from people who are shocked at just how severe measles infection can be.

“A number of them clearly said if they had known, they would have vaccinated themselves and their children against measles, but they didn’t realize how bad it was,” Nolen said.

Nolen told reporters that more than 120 people have sought emergency department care over the course of the outbreak, which began last June. Thirty-one people have been hospitalized, and three people were placed in the intensive care unit. Health providers across the state have reported measles-induced hepatitis, and aplastic crisis, which results in life-threatening anemia.

Utah has tracked 358 measles cases during this outbreak. Activity began in the southern part of the state but has spread throughout.

Prasad out at FDA after a number of public fights with drugmakers

News brief

Stephanie Soucheray, MA

For the second time in the past year, the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA’s) vaccine chief, Vinay Prasad, MD, MPH, is leaving his post, with a planned departure at the end of April, according to FDA Commissioner Marty Makary, MD, MPH.

Prasad angered pharmaceutical giants and lawmakers last month when he pulled the review process from Moderna’s new mRNA flu vaccine, then reversed course, leading to confusion and public statements from Moderna’s CEO.

This month, Prasad found himself embroiled in another public fight with UniQure, the maker of a new gene therapy for Huntington’s disease. The company said last week said the FDA was demanding a new trial of its gene therapy, and that the trial would require some participants get a sham surgery, which they called unethical.

Confusing moves

Prasad made several chaotic moves at the FDA, at times announcing changes that make the FDA review process faster, and at other times issuing new warnings and onerous study requirements for some drugs and vaccines, which slowed the process.

His most notable change is the FDA’s two-to-one policy, which says drugmakers are now required to show one well controlled clinical trial for new drug approvals instead of two.

Study links fluoroquinolone antibiotics to increased risk of panic attacks

News brief

Chris Dall, MA

White ciprofloxacin tablets on black background — Wikimedia Commons

A new study by a team of Canadian researchers hints at a potential link between fluoroquinolone antibiotics and increased risk of panic attacks.

Although fluoroquinolones are among the most widely prescribed antibiotics, they've been linked to an array of side effects, including tendinitis and tendon rupture, peripheral neuropathy (a nerve condition that causes weakness, numbness, and pain in the hands and feet), and central nervous system effects. These associations have led the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to revise its black box warning labels for fluoroquinolones several times. Despite frequent case reports of panic attacks following fluoroquinolone use, no large-scale studies have looked at the potential association.

The study, published late last week in the Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy by researchers from Western University in Ontario, included a systematic review and meta-analysis of 12 relevant studies and an analysis of individual case safety reports (ICSRs) identified in the FDA's Adverse Event Reporting System (FAERS) database. The 12 studies, published from 2004 to 2024, included four clinical trials and eight papers describing 11 case reports. The FAERS analysis compared ICSRs for fluoroquinolones (ciprofloxacin, levofloxacin, and moxifloxacin) and two comparator drugs—azithromycin and trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole.

Increased risk compared with other antibiotics

The prevalence of panic attacks in the four clinical trials ranged from 0.5% to 1.8%, with wide confidence intervals, which suggest a high level of uncertainty. Among the 1,022 panic attacks identified in FAERS, fluoroquinolones were associated with a sixfold increase in reports of panic attacks compared with azithromycin and a 12-fold increase compared with trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole. Ciprofloxacin showed the strongest signal, with double the risk of other fluoroquinolones.

The authors acknowledge that a causal relationship can't be determined because of their reliance on spontaneous reports to FAERS, which are unverified. But they say the findings align with previous research and represent the most comprehensive evidence to date on the potential association between fluoroquinolones and increased risk of panic attacks.

"While these findings from spontaneous reporting databases are hypothesis-generating, they highlight panic attacks as a distinct clinical phenotype that warrants further investigation using population-level longitudinal data," they wrote.