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The schedule at my YMCA recently changed so that my swim practice time now coincides with an Aqua Zumba class. There’s nothing more motivating for a workout than a bunch of chanting/Zumba ladies shake beside you and that’s the energy I hope you take in this weekend.

RFK Jr. is Trump’s official HHS pick

Worldwide, the rate of measles is increasing by 20% year on year

Globally, measles vaccination coverage has not returned to pre-Covid levels, leading to a 20% year-on-year increase in measles cases in 2023, according to a new report by the World Health Organization and Centers for Disease Control that was published. Thursday. More than 22 million children who should have been vaccinated last year did not receive a single dose of the vaccine.

Despite the global commitment to eliminate measles transmission, maintaining focus on the problem is a problem, said Natasha Crowcroft, WHO’s senior technical adviser on measles and rubella. “It takes an enormous global effort to reach every child,” she said. “And making that move is, if anything, increasingly difficult in the current economic environment.” Read more from Helen Branswell of STAT.

Advances in treating fatal childhood brain cancer with CAR-T

Diffuse intrinsic pontine gliomas, or DIPGs, are “the worst childhood brain tumor imaginable.” It charges so insidiously around a young man’s brain stem that no amount of chemotherapy or scalpel can extricate it. Most children do not survive a year.

A new CAR-T cancer treatment is raising hopes that DIPG could finally be pronounced something less than a universal death sentence. This method of binding cancer-seeking receptors on patients’ immune cells produced Lazarus-like responses in children and adults with leukemia. But it has been difficult to apply to solid tumors.

One patient who received the new therapy, 20-year-old Drew, is alive and in remission 30 months after treatment for DIPG. But while the treatment shrank tumors for four of 11 patients in a recent study, nine patients ultimately died. While this represents progress compared to what was possible even five years ago, the treatment has a long way to go and faces a tough road to market as there are only about 300 DIPG patients per year.

Read more from STAT’s Jason Mast to hear the stories of Michelle Monje-Deisseroth, the investigator leading the trial, and Jace Ward, a former high school football star with DIPG.

Health

The FDA’s Califf says the agency is cracking down on ultra-processed foods

Ultra-processed foods such as chicken nuggets and cookie bars is a huge point of contention in health policy, as well as a target in RFK Jr. Make America Healthy Again agenda.

While officials who developed the 2025-2030 U.S. Dietary Guidelines recently decided to hold off on making guidelines for ultra-processed foodsThe FDA doesn’t expect to act on them, according to an early STAT opinion by agency chief Robert Califf and other food and disease officials. They are already working to lower sodium levels in foods. “In the near future, we expect to finalize an updated definition for “healthy” statement. and we continue to work to propose nutrition labeling on the front of the package“, they write.

Read more, including officials’ interest in better research into ultra-processed foods, Here.

Public policy scientists? The poll says: Maybe not

Americans’ trust in scientists is on the rise again, according to a new survey Pew Research Center survey by more than 9,500 US adults – but with some important caveats. Many do not want scientists involved in public policy, and even fewer people think scientists are good communicators.

Seventy-six percent of Americans expressed confidence in scientists to act in the public interest. That’s up from 73% last year, but still well below pre-pandemic levels.

The poll found mixed attitudes about whether Americans think scientists should be involved in public policy debates on science issues, with 51 percent saying scientists should play an active role, compared to 48 percent saying that scientists should focus on fact-finding rather than participating in public policy.

The perception of scientists’ social skills isn’t great either: less than half of respondents (45%) said scientists are good communicators. About half of Americans consider scientists “socially awkward” and 47% feel that scientists “feel superior to others.” On the bright side, 89% consider scientists intelligent.

What we read

• Can AI review the scientific literature – and figure out what it all means? Nature
• Science is inherently inefficient, Slate
• Trace of Bird Flu Detected in Oahu Wastewater, Civilian Drunk
• Faced with a dialogue with RFK Jr., a top FDA official mounts a public defense of vaccines, STATE
• Black infant mortality rate more than double that of white infants: CDC, ABC
• With a boost from RFK Jr. and Tucker Carlson, two entrepreneurs with chronic illnesses are moving into Trump’s orbit, STATE