Category: Science

JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA — Some South African organizations that assist people with HIV are in limbo, after the United States put a 90-day freeze on most foreign aid. The U.S. State Department later added a waiver for “lifesaving” aid, but NGOs that have already shut their doors say the next steps aren’t clear, and they are worried this could set back years of progress.

South Africa has the highest number of HIV-positive people in the world — about 8 million — but has also been a huge success story in terms of treatment and preventing new infections.

That’s largely due to the money poured into expert HIV care here, 17% of which comes from a U.S. program called the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, also known as PEPFAR.

But, a 90-day foreign aid funding freeze is in effect, following an executive order by U.S. President Donald Trump last month to check if U.S.-funded programs overseas are aligned with U.S. policies. This has caused some confusion in South Africa with health care organizations and their patients.

Thamsanqa Siyo, an HIV-positive transgender woman in South Africa, is anxious.

“People are frustrated, they’re living in fear, they don’t know what’s going to happen,” said Siyo. “They don’t know if it’s stopped temporarily or not temporarily.”

The Cape Town clinic that Siyo used to go to has now been closed for two weeks.

While the State Department has issued a waiver to continue paying for “lifesaving” services, what that includes remains unclear to many South African organizations that receive funding from PEPFAR.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said this week that the waiver was clear.

“If it saves lives, if it’s emergency lifesaving aid — food, medicine, whatever — they have a waiver,” said Rubio. “I don’t know how much clearer we can be.”

The State Department also issued written clarification and guidance on February 1 regarding which activities are and are not covered by the waiver for PEPFAR programs.

The South African government said it was blindsided by the U.S. aid freeze, according to Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi, who convened a meeting about PEPFAR on Wednesday.

Motsoaledi also said he has sought clarity on the waiver.

“If you say American money cannot be used for LGBTQWI+ and we do the counseling and testing and somebody who falls within that category, transgender, tests positive, can they not be helped?” he asked. “Even if it’s lifesaving?”

Linda-Gail Bekker is a doctor and scientist who heads the Desmond Tutu HIV Center in South Africa.

“This is not one homogenous picture,” said Bekker. “In some places, it’s parts of services that have been stopped. In other places, the whole clinic, if it was supplied by PEPFAR, has been closed down.”

She also said that some transgender health services have been completely closed, and in other areas, counselors haven’t been able to come in.

In addition, she said some services and drugs are no longer available, such as community-based testing and pre-exposure prophylaxis, a medicine that prevents people at high risk from contracting HIV.

Ling Sheperd, who works for Triangle Project, an nongovernmental organization that provides services for the queer community, said there’s a risk of “undoing decades of progress.”

“The impact is devastating,” said Sheperd. “The PEPFAR funding has been a lifeline for millions and it ensures access to HIV treatment, prevention services, and of course community-based health care. And without it we are seeing interruptions in medication supply, clinics are scaling back services, and community health workers have literally been losing their livelihoods.”

About 5.5 million South Africans are on anti-retroviral medication for HIV. Motsoaledi noted that most of that is funded by the government here.

However, he said, a PEPFAR shortfall will affect training, facilities and service delivery. The government said it is working on contingency plans that would reduce dependence on foreign aid in the HIV sector.

On Wednesday, a group of health organizations sent a letter to the South African government saying at least 900,000 patients with HIV were directly affected by the U.S. stop-work orders.
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Robots with reasoning power are becoming a reality thanks to massive amounts of training data and breakthroughs in artificial intelligence. VOA’s Matt Dibble visits a lab where robots are learning to solve problems themselves. Cameras: Matt Dibble, Tina Trinh.
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WASHINGTON — A bipartisan duo in the U.S. House is proposing legislation to ban the Chinese artificial intelligence app DeepSeek from federal devices, similar to the policy already in place for the popular social media platform TikTok.

Lawmakers Josh Gottheimer, a Democrat from New Jersey, and Darin LaHood, a Republican from Illinois, on Thursday introduced the “No DeepSeek on Government Devices Act,” which would ban federal employees from using the Chinese AI app on government-owned electronics. They cited the Chinese government’s ability to use the app for surveillance and misinformation as reasons to keep it away from federal networks.

“The Chinese Communist Party has made it abundantly clear that it will exploit any tool at its disposal to undermine our national security, spew harmful disinformation, and collect data on Americans,” Gottheimer said in a statement. “We simply can’t risk the CCP infiltrating the devices of our government officials and jeopardizing our national security.”

The proposal comes after the Chinese software company in January published an AI model that performed at a competitive level with models developed by American firms like OpenAI, Meta, Alphabet and others. DeepSeek purported to develop the model at a fraction of the cost of its American counterparts. The announcement raised alarm bells and prompted debates among policymakers and leading Silicon Valley financiers and technologists.

The churn over AI is coming at a moment of heightened competition between the U.S. and China in a range of areas, including technological innovation. The U.S. has levied tariffs on Chinese goods, restricted Chinese tech firms like Huawei from being used in government systems, and banned the export of state of the art microchips thought to be needed to develop the highest end AI models.

Last year, Congress and then-President Joe Biden approved a divestment of the popular social media platform TikTok from its Chinese parent company or face a ban across the U.S.; that policy is now on hold. President Donald Trump, who originally proposed a ban of the app in his first term, signed an executive order last month extending a window for a long-term solution before the legally required ban takes effect.

In 2023, Biden banned TikTok from federal-issued devices.

“The technology race with the Chinese Communist Party is not one the United States can afford to lose,” LaHood said in a statement. “This commonsense, bipartisan piece of legislation will ban the app from federal workers’ phones while closing backdoor operations the company seeks to exploit for access. It is critical that Congress safeguard Americans’ data and continue to ensure American leadership in AI.”

The bill would single out DeepSeek and any AI application developed by its parent company, the hedge fund High-Flyer, as subject to the ban. The legislation includes exceptions for national security and research purposes that would allow federal employers to study DeepSeek.

Some lawmakers wish to go further. A bill proposed last week by Senator Josh Hawley, a Republican from Missouri, would bar the import or export of any AI technology from China writ large, citing national security concerns.
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U.S. dairy cattle tested positive for a strain of bird flu that previously had not been seen in cows, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said on Wednesday, ramping up concerns about the persistent spread of the virus. 

The H5N1 virus has reduced milk output in cattle, pushed up egg prices by wiping out millions of hens, and infected nearly 70 people since April as it has spread across the country. 

Genome sequencing of milk from Nevada identified the different strain, known as the D1.1 genotype, in dairy cows for the first time, the USDA said. Previously, all 957 bird flu infections among dairy herds reported since last March had been caused by another strain, the B3.13 genotype, according to the agency. 

Reuters reported news of the detection of the second strain on Wednesday ahead of USDA’s announcement. 

The second strain was the predominant genotype among wild birds this past fall and winter and has also been found in poultry, the USDA said. It was identified in dairy cattle through an agency program that began testing milk for bird flu in December. 

“We’re seeing the H5N1 virus itself be smarter than all of us,” said Beth Thompson, South Dakota’s state veterinarian.  

“It’s modifying itself so it’s not just staying in the poultry and the wild waterfowl. It’s picking up a home in the mammals.”  

Wild birds likely transmitted the second strain to cattle in Nevada, said J.J. Goicoechea, Nevada’s agriculture director. Farmers need to ramp up safety and security measures to protect their animals, he said. 

“We obviously aren’t doing everything we can and everything we should or the virus wouldn’t be getting in,” he said. 

The Nevada Department of Agriculture said on Jan. 31 that herds in two counties had been placed under quarantine because of bird flu detections.  

It is important for the USDA to contain the outbreak in the state quickly, so the strain does not spread to dairy cattle elsewhere, said Gail Hansen, a veterinary and public health consultant. 

Last year, bird flu spread across the country as infected cattle were shipped from Texas after the virus first leapt to cows from wild birds. 

“We didn’t get a hold on it before,” Hansen said. “We want to avoid that same scenario from happening in Nevada.” 

Dairy herds that were formerly infected may be at risk again from the second strain, experts said. 

“Now it looks like we have new strains of virus that may escape some of the immunity associated with the other strains of viruses that could exacerbate the epidemics among animals and wildlife,” said Gregory Gray, a University of Texas Medical Branch professor studying cattle diseases.  

“It’s alarming.”
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BUENOS AIRES — President Javier Milei has ordered Argentina’s withdrawal from the World Health Organization due to profound differences with the U.N. agency, a presidential spokesperson said Wednesday.

Milei’s action echoes that of his ally, U.S. President Donald Trump, who began the process of pulling the United States out of the WHO with an executive order on his first day back in office on Jan. 21.

Argentina’s decision is based on “profound differences in health management, especially during the [COVID19] pandemic,” spokesperson Manuel Adorni said at a news conference in Buenos Aires. He said that WHO guidelines at the time had led to the largest shutdown “in the history of mankind.”

He also said that the WHO lacked independence because of the political influence of some countries, without elaborating which countries.

Argentina will not allow an international organization to intervene in its sovereignty “and much less in our health,” Adorni said.

The WHO is the United Nations’ specialized health agency and is the only organization mandated to coordinate global responses to acute health crises, particularly outbreaks of new diseases and persistent threats such as Ebola, AIDS and mpox.
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U.S. prosecutors on Tuesday unveiled an expanded 14-count indictment accusing former Google software engineer Linwei Ding of stealing artificial intelligence trade secrets to benefit two Chinese companies he was secretly working for. 

Ding, 38, a Chinese national, was charged by a federal grand jury in San Francisco with seven counts each of economic espionage and theft of trade secrets. 

Each economic espionage charge carries a maximum 15-year prison term and $5 million fine, while each trade secrets charge carries a maximum 10-year term and $250,000 fine. 

The defendant, also known as Leon Ding, was indicted last March on four counts of theft of trade secrets. He is free on bond. His lawyers did not immediately respond to requests for comment. 

Ding’s case was coordinated through an interagency Disruptive Technology Strike Force created in 2023 by the Biden administration. 

The initiative was designed to help stop advanced technology from being acquired by countries such as China and Russia or potentially threatening national security. 

Prosecutors said Ding stole information about the hardware infrastructure and software platform that lets Google’s supercomputing data centers train large AI models. 

Some of the allegedly stolen chip blueprints were meant to give Google an edge over cloud computing rivals Amazon and Microsoft, which design their own, and reduce Google’s reliance on chips from Nvidia. 

Prosecutors said Ding joined Google in May 2019 and began his thefts three years later when he was being courted to join an early-stage Chinese technology company. 

Ding allegedly uploaded more than 1,000 confidential files by May 2023 and later circulated a PowerPoint presentation to employees of a China startup he founded, saying that country’s policies encouraged development of a domestic AI industry. 

Google was not charged and has said it cooperated with law enforcement. 

According to court records describing a December 18 hearing, prosecutors and defense lawyers discussed a “potential resolution” to Ding’s case, “but anticipate the matter proceeding to trial.” 

The case is U.S. v. Ding, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, No. 24-cr-00141. 
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Scientists are testing a novel technique to deter poachers targeting endangered rhinoceroses for their prized horns. As part of a pilot study in South Africa, researchers have injected small, radioactive pellets into the horns of live rhinos. The goal is to make the horns radioactive so there is less demand for them on the black market. Marize de Klerk reports from the UNESCO Waterberg Biosphere Reserve.
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Abuja, Nigeria — Nigerian officials have launched a committee to develop a transition and sustainability plan for USAID-funded health programs following U.S. President Donald Trump’s 90-day halt of most foreign aid. The multi-ministerial committee aims to secure new financial support for critical health programs. 

Nigeria’s health minister said the committee—comprising officials from the ministries of finance, health, and environment—intends to ensure that patients receiving treatment for HIV, tuberculosis, and malaria do not experience setbacks amid the uncertainty over U.S. foreign policy.

Shortly after taking office two weeks ago, U.S. President Donald Trump ordered a 90-day pause on U.S. foreign aid. But days later, he approved a temporary waiver for life-saving humanitarian assistance, covering medicine, medical services, food, and shelter.

Despite the exemption, concerns remain over the future of U.S. funding for global health programs.

Public health expert Ejike Orji welcomed Nigeria’s proactive response to the U.S. funding freeze.

“What this means is that they’re going to do a review, situation assessment of what’s going on and that would give them the opportunity to make recommendations to the government. They (U.S.) gave a ninety-day review because of the strategic importance of continuing the HIV program in Nigeria, so that means there’s still a possibility after their review, they might say, ‘Look, we don’t want to continue this funding,” said Orji.

Nigeria is a significant recipient of U.S. foreign aid, receiving $1.02 billion in 2023, much of it through agencies like USAID.

USAID funding to Nigeria plays a pivotal role in HIV/AIDS treatment, maternal and child care, and disease prevention efforts.

On Monday, the Nigerian Federal Executive Council approved $1 billion for healthcare sector reforms and allocated an additional $3.2 million to procure 150,000 HIV treatment packs over the next four months.

Authorities said the new funding will support improvements in primary healthcare services, maternal and child healthcare, and training of healthcare professionals.

But Ndeayo Iwot, general secretary of the Health Sector Reforms Coalition, said it will be difficult to sustain those programs without continued U.S. support.

“Even when they’re releasing the available funds on time, they will not be able to cover all the areas that those funds [aid] were helping them to achieve. It will take time, probably two, three years,” said Iwot.

Approximately 1.8 million Nigerians are living with HIV. The country also accounts for the world’s highest number of malaria deaths and ranks among the top countries for tuberculosis cases.

Iwot said Nigeria needs new partnerships for health programs.

“Health needs a multi sectoral approach, it works on partnerships, there are certain things you shouldn’t do alone as a country. Going through resource pulling from many partners and stakeholders is a recommended approach to financing health activities,” said Iwot.

Currently, only about 4% of Nigeria’s annual budget is allocated to the health sector—far below the 15 percent target set by African leaders in the 2001 Abuja Declaration.

It’s unclear whether the U.S. will reverse its decision after the 90-day pause. But with uncertainty looming, analysts say careful implementation of policies and new partnerships may be Nigeria’s best path forward.
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Washington — Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the controversial environmental lawyer turned public health critic, cleared his first hurdle on Tuesday to become the nation’s top health official when the senate finance committee voted to advance his nomination for a floor vote. 

Republicans voted together to advance his nomination, while Democrats all opposed. 

His nomination now will face a full senate vote, despite concerns about the work he’s done to sow doubts around vaccine safety and his potential to profit off lawsuits over drugmakers. 

To gain control of the $1.7 trillion Health and Human Services agency, Kennedy will need support from all but three Republicans if Democrats uniformly oppose him. 

Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, who is also a physician and sits on the finance committee, voted to advance Kennedy’s confirmation. Last week, during Kennedy’s hearings, Cassidy repeatedly implored Kennedy to reject a disproven theory that vaccines cause autism, to no avail. He ended the hearing by saying he was “struggling” with the vote. 

“Your past, undermining confidence in vaccines with unfounded or misleading arguments, concerns me,” Cassidy told Kennedy. 

Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky are all seen as potential no votes, too, because they voted against President Donald Trump’s defense secretary nominee and have expressed concerns about Kennedy’s anti-vaccine work. 

In a CBS “60 Minutes” interview that aired Sunday, McConnell declined to say how he would vote on Kennedy’s nomination but reiterated “vaccines are critically important.” 

Democrats, meanwhile, continue to raise alarms about Kennedy’s potential to financially benefit from changing vaccine guidelines or weakening federal lawsuit protections against vaccine makers if confirmed as health secretary. 

“It seems possible that many different types of vaccine-related decisions and communications — which you would be empowered to make and influence as Secretary — could result in significant financial compensation for your family,” Democratic Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Ron Wyden of Oregon wrote in a letter sent over the weekend to Kennedy. 

Kennedy said he’ll give his son all of the referral fees in legal cases against vaccine makers, including the fees he gets from referring clients in a case against Merck. Kennedy told the committee he’s referred hundreds of clients to a law firm that’s suing Merck’s Gardasil, the human papillomavirus vaccine that prevents cervical cancer. He’s earned $2.5 million from the deal over the past three years. 

As secretary, Kennedy will oversee vaccine recommendations and public health campaigns for the $1.7 trillion agency, which is also responsible for food and hospital inspections, providing health insurance for millions of Americans and researching deadly diseases. 

Kennedy, a longtime Democrat, ran for president but withdrew last year to throw his support to Trump in exchange for an influential job in his Republican administration. Together, they have forged a new and unusual coalition made up of conservatives who oppose vaccines and liberals who want to see the government promote healthier foods. Trump and Kennedy have branded the movement as “Make America Healthy Again.” 
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Not all children can play with conventional toys. At a school in New York, occupational therapists are taking off-the-shelf toys and adapting them to make them more suitable for disabled students’ needs. Tina Trinh reports.
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PARIS — France hosts top tech players next week at an artificial intelligence summit meant as a “wake-up call” for Europe as it struggles with AI challenges from the United States and China.

Players from across the sector and representatives from 80 nations will gather in the French capital on February 10 and 11 in the sumptuous Grand Palais, built for the 1900 Universal Exhibition.

In the run-up, President Emmanuel Macron will on Feb. 4 visit research centers applying AI to science and health, before hosting scientists and Nobel Prize winners at his Elysee Palace residence on Wednesday.

A wider science conference will be held at the Polytechnique engineering school on Thursday and Friday.

“The summit comes at exactly the right time for this wake-up call for France and Europe, and to show we are in position” to take advantage of the technology, an official in Macron’s office told reporters.

In recent weeks, Washington’s announcement of $500 billion in investment to build up AI infrastructure and the release of a frugal but powerful generative AI model by Chinese firm DeepSeek have focused minds in Europe.

France must “not let this revolution pass it by,” Macron’s office said.

Attendees at the summit will include Sam Altman, head of OpenAI — the firm that brought generative models to public consciousness in 2022 with the launch of ChatGPT.

Google boss Sundar Pichai and Nobel Prize winner Demis Hassabis, who leads the company’s DeepMind AI research unit, will also come, alongside Arthur Mensch, founder of French AI developer Mistral.

The Elysee has said there are “talks” on hosting DeepSeek founder Liang Wenfeng, and has yet to clarify whether X owner Elon Musk — who has his own generative initiative, xAI — has accepted an invitation.

Nor is it clear who will attend from the United States and China, with the French presidency saying only “very high level” representatives will come.

Confirmed guests from Europe include European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

‘Stoke confidence’

The tone of the AI summit will be “neither catastrophizing, nor naive,” Macron’s AI envoy Anne Bouverot told AFP.

Hosting the conference is also an opportunity for Paris to show off its own AI ecosystem, which numbers around 750 companies.

Macron’s office has said the summit would see the announcement of “massive” investments along the lines of his annual “Choose France” business conference, at which $15.4 billion of inward investment were pledged in 2024.

Beyond the economic opportunities, AI’s impact on culture including artistic creativity and news production will be discussed in a side-event over the weekend.

Debates open to the public, such as that one, are aimed at showing off “positive use cases for AI” to “stoke confidence and speed up adoption” of the technology, said France’s digital minister Clara Chappaz.

For now, the French public is skeptical of AI, with 79 percent of respondents telling pollsters Ifop they were “concerned” about the technology in a recent survey.

More ‘inclusive’ AI?

Paris says it also hopes the summit can help kick off its vision of a more ethical and accessible and less resource-intensive AI.

At present, “the AI under development is pushed by a few large players from a few countries,” Bouverot said, whereas France wants “to promote more inclusive development.”

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been invited to co-host the Paris summit, in a push to bring governments on board.

One of the summit’s aims is the establishment of a public-interest foundation for which Paris aims to raise $2.5 billion over five years.

The effort would be “a public-private partnership between various governments, businesses and philanthropic foundations from different countries,” Macron’s office said.

Paris hopes at the summit to chart different efforts at AI governance around the world and gather commitments for environmentally sustainable AI — although no binding mechanism is planned for now.

“There are lots of big principles emerging around responsible, trustworthy AI, but it’s not clear or easy to implement for the engineers in technical terms,” said Laure de Roucy-Rochegonde, director of the geopolitical technology center at the French Institute for International Relations.
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Uganda began a vaccine trial Monday against the Sudan strain of Ebola that has killed one person in the outbreak declared last week.

World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Monday in a post on the X social media platform that the trial was “initiated with record speed, only three days since the outbreak was declared, while ensuring full compliance with international and national regulatory and ethical requirements.”

Officials have not identified the vaccine manufacturer that is providing the East African country with access to more than 2,000 doses of the candidate vaccine.

WHO is supporting Uganda’s response to the outbreak with a $1 million allocation from its Contingency Fund for Emergencies.

So far, there has been only one death attributed to the virus — a nurse who worked at the Mulago National Referral Hospital in Kampala, Uganda’s capital. Two more cases were confirmed on Monday. The Associated Press reported they were members of the nurse’s family.

The nurse sought treatment at several hospitals and had also consulted with a traditional healer before tests confirmed an Ebola diagnosis, according to authorities.

Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, WHO regional director for Africa said in a statement after the outbreak was confirmed, “We welcome the prompt declaration of this outbreak, and as a comprehensive response is being established, we are supporting the government and partners to scale up measures to quicky identify cases, isolate and provide care, curb the spread of the virus and protect the population.”

Uganda’s Health Ministry has identified at least 234 of the nurse’s contacts, according to the AP. Containing the virus could prove challenging in Kampala with its population of 4 million people.

The symptoms of Ebola, an often-fatal disease, include fever, vomiting, diarrhea, muscle pain and at times internal and external bleeding.

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, health care workers and family members caring for someone with Ebola are at high risk for contracting the disease.

WHO said Ebola “is transmitted to people from wild animals (such as fruit bats, porcupines and non-human primates) and then spreads in the human population through direct contact with the blood, secretions, organs or other bodily fluids of infected people, and with surfaces and materials (e.g., bedding, clothing) contaminated with these fluids.”

Ebola’s fatality rate is around 50%, WHO said on its website, but it also said that fatality rates have varied from 25% to 90% in some outbreaks.

The outbreak in Uganda is the first Ebola outbreak since U.S. President Donald Trump announced the U.S. withdrawal from the World Health Organization.

Some information was provided by The Associated Press and Agence France-Presse.
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The recent outbreak of the H5N1 avian influenza virus in the U.S. and the potential for it to mutate has raised concerns among the scientific community that it could result in human-to-human transmission and a new pandemic. Farmers are also concerned about the potential impacts on their livelihood. VOA’s Veronica Balderas Iglesias reports.
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Arlington, Virginia — A baby food maker is recalling edible sticks meant to ease teething pain over a possible choking hazard. 

Gerber announced Friday that it was recalling and discontinuing its brand of “Sooth N Chew” teething sticks after receiving customer complaints about choking. The company said one emergency room visit had been reported. 

The teething sticks are edible teethers marketed to parents and guardians of children six months and older. They come in strawberry-apple and banana flavors. 

Gerber said it was working with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on the recall. 

Customers who bought the teething sticks should return them to stores where they were purchased for a refund, the company said. 

Anyone concerned about an injury or illness should contact a health care provider. For any additional support needed, Gerber is available 24/7 at 1-800-4-GERBER (1-800-443-7237). 

The company says it is working with the U.S. FDA on this recall and will cooperate with them fully. 
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Kampala, Uganda — Ugandan officials are preparing to deploy a trial vaccine as part of efforts to stem an outbreak of Ebola in the capital, Kampala, a top health official said Sunday.

A range of scientists are developing research protocols relating to the planned deployment of more than 2,000 doses of a candidate vaccine against the Sudan strain of Ebola, said Pontiano Kaleebu, executive director of Uganda Virus Research Institute.

“Protocol is being accelerated” to get all the necessary regulatory approvals, he said. “This vaccine is not yet licensed.”

The World Health Organization said in a statement that its support to Uganda’s response to the outbreak includes access to 2,160 doses of trial vaccine.

“Research teams have been deployed to the field to work along with the surveillance teams as approvals are awaited,” the WHO statement said.

The candidate vaccine as well as candidate treatments are being made available through clinical trial protocols to further test for efficacy and safety, it said.

The vaccine maker wasn’t immediately known. There are no approved vaccines for the Sudan strain of Ebola that killed a nurse employed at Kampala’s main referral hospital. The man died on Wednesday and authorities declared an outbreak the next day.

 Officials are still investigating the source of the outbreak, and there has been no other confirmed case.

Uganda has had access to candidate vaccine doses since the end of an Ebola outbreak in September 2022 that killed at least 55 people. Ugandan officials ran out of time to begin a vaccine study when that outbreak, in central Uganda, was declared over about four months later, Kaleebu said.

A trial vaccine known as rVSV-ZEBOV, used to vaccinate 3,000 people at risk of infection during an outbreak of the Zaire strain of Ebola in eastern Congo between 2018 and 2020, proved effective in containing the spread of the disease there.

Uganda has had multiple Ebola outbreaks, including one in 2000 that killed hundreds. The 2014-16 Ebola outbreak in West Africa killed more than 11,000 people, the disease’s largest death toll.

Tracing contacts is also key to stemming the spread of Ebola, which manifests as a viral hemorrhagic fever.

At least 44 contacts of the victim in the current outbreak have been identified, including 30 health workers and patients, according to Uganda’s Ministry of Health.

Confirmation of Ebola in Uganda is the latest in a series of outbreaks of viral hemorrhagic fevers in the east African region. Tanzania declared an outbreak of the Ebola-like Marburg disease earlier this month, while in December Rwanda announced that its own outbreak of Marburg was over. The ongoing Marburg outbreak in northern Tanzania’s Kagera region has killed at least two people, according to local health authorities.

Kampala’s outbreak could prove difficult to respond to, because the city has a highly mobile population of about 4 million. The nurse who died had sought treatment at a hospital just outside Kampala and later traveled to Mbale, in the country’s east, where he was admitted to a public hospital. Health authorities said the man also sought the services of a traditional healer.

Ebola is spread by contact with bodily fluids of an infected person or contaminated materials. Symptoms include fever, vomiting, diarrhea, muscle pain and at times internal and external bleeding.

Scientists don’t know the natural reservoir of Ebola, but they suspect the first person infected in an outbreak acquired the virus through contact with an infected animal or eating its raw meat.

Ebola was discovered in 1976 in two simultaneous outbreaks in South Sudan and Congo, where it occurred in a village near the Ebola River, after which the disease is named.
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TOKYO — Japan’s space agency said Sunday it successfully launched a navigation satellite on its new flagship H3 rocket as the country seeks to have a more precise location positioning system of its own. 

The H3 rocket carrying the Michibiki 6 satellite lifted off from the Tanegashima Space Center on a southwestern Japanese island. 

Everything went smoothly and the satellite successfully separated from the rocket as planned about 29 minutes after the liftoff, said Makoto Arita, H3 project manager for the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA. 

Officials said it is expected to reach its targeted geospatial orbit in about two weeks. 

Japan currently has the quasi-zenith satellite system, or QZSS, with four satellites for a regional navigation system that first went into operation in 2018. The Michibiki 6 will be the fifth of its network. 

Michibiki’s signals are used to supplement American GPS and will further improve positioning data for smartphones, car and maritime navigation and drones. 

Japan plans to launch two more navigation satellites to have a seven-satellite system by March 2026 to have a more precise global positioning capability without relying on foreign services, including the U.S., according to the Japan Science and Technology Agency. By the late 2030s, Japan plans to have an 11-satellite network. 

Sunday’s launch, delayed by a day due to the weather, was the fourth consecutive successful flight for the H3 system after a shocking failed debut attempt last year when the rocket had to be destroyed with its payload. 

Japan sees a stable, commercially competitive space transport capability as key to its space program and national security and has been developing two new flagship rockets as successors to the mainstay H2A series — the larger H3 and a much smaller Epsilon system. It hopes to cater to diverse customer needs and improve its position in the growing satellite launch market. 

 
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LONDON — Britain will become the first country to introduce laws against AI tools used to generate sexual abuse images, the government announced Saturday.

The government will make it illegal to possess, create or distribute AI tools designed to generate sexualized images of children, punishable by up to five years in prison, interior minister Yvette Cooper revealed.

It will also be illegal to possess AI “pedophile manuals” which teach people how to use AI to sexually abuse children, punishable by up to three years in prison.

“We know that sick predators’ activities online often lead to them carrying out the most horrific abuse in person,” said Cooper.

The new laws are “designed to keep our children safe online as technologies evolve. It is vital that we tackle child sexual abuse online as well as offline,” she added.

“Children will be protected from the growing threat of predators generating AI images and from online sexual abuse as the U.K. becomes the first country in the world to create new AI sexual abuse offences,” said a government statement.

AI tools are being used to generate child sexual abuse images by “nudeifying” real life images of children or by “stitching the faces of other children onto existing images,” said the government.

The new laws will also criminalize “predators who run websites designed for other pedophiles to share vile child sexual abuse content or advice on how to groom children,” punishable by up to ten years in prison, said the government.

The measures will be introduced as part of the Crime and Policing Bill when it comes to parliament.

The Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) has warned of the growing number of sexual abuse AI images of children being produced.

Over a 30-day period in 2024, IWF analysts identified 3,512 AI child abuse images on a single dark web site.

The number of the most serious category of images also rose by 10% in a year, it found.
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WASHINGTON — The U.S. State Department said Saturday that the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) — the world’s leading HIV initiative — was covered by a waiver for life-saving humanitarian assistance during a 90-day pause in foreign aid.

Just hours after taking office on Jan. 20, President Donald Trump ordered the pause so foreign aid contributions could be reviewed to see if they align with his “America First” foreign policy. The U.S. is the world’s largest aid donor.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio initially issued a waiver for emergency food aid and then Tuesday for life-saving medicine, medical services, food, shelter and subsistence help. However, the lack of detail in Trump’s order and the ensuing waivers has left aid groups confused as to whether their work can continue.

So, Saturday the State Department’s Bureau of Global Health Security and Diplomacy issued a memo, seen by Reuters, clarifying that PEPFAR was covered by the Jan. 28 memo and spelling out what activities were allowed.

These include life-saving HIV care and treatment services, including testing and counseling, prevention and treatment of infections including tuberculosis (TB), laboratory services, and procurement and supply chain for commodities/medicines. It also allows prevention of mother-to-child transmission services.

“Any other activities not specifically mentioned in this guidance may not be resumed without express approval,” it said.

More than 20 million people living with HIV, who represent two-thirds of all people living with the disease receiving treatment globally, are directly supported by PEPFAR.

Under Trump’s foreign aid pause, all payments by U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) stopped Tuesday — for the first time since the fiscal year began on Oct. 1 — and have not resumed, according to U.S. Treasury data. On Monday USAID paid out $8 million and last week a total of $545 million.

The Trump administration is also moving to strip a slimmed-down USAID of its independence and put it under State Department control, two sources familiar with the discussions said Friday, in what would be a significant overhaul of how Washington allocates U.S. foreign aid. 
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