• The death toll in the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has officially topped 1,000, with 1,035 fatalities reported yesterday among 2,557 cases. Ituri province in the DRC accounts for 90% of all virus activity, and the case-fatality rate of the outbreak is now at 40%. Ituri is home to several refugee camps housing up to 1 million Congolese. The camps lack basic water or other sanitary systems, with conditions worsening since the second Trump administration cut foreign aid. According to theNew York Times, funding for toilets and hand-washing stations in Congo was cut by more than half between 2024 and 2025. This is the DRC’s17th Ebola outbreak but only the third caused by the Bundibugyo strain in history.
• Delaware now has four measles cases after going more than a decade without a single detection, and the state has officially declared an outbreak. It is not known at this time if the cases are connected to an unvaccinated Kent County man, the state’s initial measles case reported earlier this week.
• The World Health Organization (WHO) announced three new cases of human H9N2 avian flu from July 10 to 16, all reported from China. All three case-patients had exposure to live poultry; two cases were in 4-year-old boys, and one case was in a 44-year-old man. The boys have recovered. but the adult remains in an intensive care unit. Since 2015, 173 cases of human infection with avian influenza A(H9N2), including two deaths, have been recorded, with 170 cases reported from China.

A study yesterday in the Journal of Pediatric Health Care finds no difference in any of 13 US infant health outcomes and conditions before the COVID-19 pandemic and after their mothers were vaccinated against infection slightly before or during pregnancy.

Researchers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention parsed data from the COVID-19 Vaccine Pregnancy Registry (C19VPR), which tracked pregnant women who received a COVID-19 vaccine from December 2020 to June 2021. The team interviewed the women at least three times about infant outcomes and conditions for three months after birth, and for a subsample, through 15 months.

The goal was to compare prepandemic with pandemic rates of low birthweight (LBW), small for gestational age (SGA), death, cardiac arrest, cardiomyopathy, congenital hearing loss, heart failure, intussusception (abnormally folded intestine), myocarditis/pericarditis, seizures, stroke, supraventricular tachycardia (rapid heartbeat), and hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy from low oxygen or blood flow to the brain before, during, or after birth. 

Lower rates of low birth weight, death lower during pandemic

Among 19,852 infants born during the pandemic with 3-month data, 0.6% had at least one studied condition. The rates of LBW (72.6 per 1,000 live births), SGA (71.2 per 1,000), and infant death (1.5 per 1,000) were lower than prepandemic rates based on birth data from the 2023 National Vital Statistics System.

These findings can help inform pediatric healthcare providers and nurses in their discussions with parents who may be concerned about health conditions of their children following maternal COVID-19 vaccination.

Of the 32 infant deaths occurring from birth through three months, 62.5% were preterm. The main reasons for death included (28.1%), birth defect (25%), sepsis (9.4%), hypoxic- ischemic encephalopathy (9.4%), sudden infant death (6.3%), accident (3.1%), and blood clots (3.1%). 

Of the 92.9% infants with three-month follow-up data, 0.6% were diagnosed as having at least one studied condition. Among the 9,156 infants with 15-month data, 1.2% had at least one condition.

“The incidence of LBW, SGA, death, or each of 10 prespecified infant conditions in C19VPR did not exceed prepandemic estimates,” the authors concluded. “These findings can help inform pediatric healthcare providers and nurses in their discussions with parents who may be concerned about health conditions of their children following maternal COVID-19 vaccination.”