Americans Aren't Sleeping Enough
A May 2026 CDC data brief reports that 30.5% of U.S. adults surveyed in 2024 are sleeping fewer than the recommended seven hours per night, a figure largely unchanged since 2020. Sleep insufficiency is clinically associated with cardiometabolic conditions including diabetes, obesity, and cardiovascular disease.
Approximately 15% of adults report difficulty falling asleep and 18% struggle to s…
Three Passengers Dead After Suspected Hantavirus Outbreak on Cruise Ship
A suspected hantavirus outbreak aboard the MV Hondius, a cruise vessel traveling between Argentina and Cape Verde, has resulted in three deaths and at least three additional cases as of early May 2026. The WHO has confirmed at least one case, with epidemiological and genomic sequencing investigations ongoing.
Hantavirus — typically transmitted through contact with infected rodent excreta — ca…
FDA Names New Director for Vaccines, Biologics Unit
The FDA has appointed Katherine Szarama as acting director of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER), the unit responsible for evaluating the safety, effectiveness, and availability of vaccines and other biological products for human use.
Szarama, who previously served as CBER's deputy director under Vinay Prasad, brings prior experience from the Centers for Medicare and Medi…
Avoid These Three Mistakes When Reaching Out to Journalists
Public health communicators who regularly engage media contacts can strengthen those relationships by avoiding three common pitching missteps. According to Cision's State of the Media Report, 78% of journalists will block sources who repeatedly send irrelevant pitches, while Muck Rack's State of Journalism Report finds only 3% of journalists report that pitches consistently match their coverage…
New CDC Data Dashboard Shows Emerging Fentanyl and Polysubstance Use Trends
CDC's Division of Overdose Prevention has launched the Clinical Drug Test Dashboard, a new interactive tool tracking trends in fentanyl, heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine, and polysubstance use among adults diagnosed with substance use disorders.
Powered by clinical urine drug test data from Millennium Health — representing more than 650,000 specimens collected between October 2023 and Decembe…
CDC Data Show Weekly ER Visits for Tick Bites Higher than Usual
CDC's Tick Bite Data Tracker shows weekly emergency department visits for tick bites are currently above historical norms in most U.S. regions, with rates in all areas except the South Central U.S. at their highest for this time of year since 2017.
CDC is urging preventive measures ahead of Lyme Disease Awareness Month in May, citing risks of Lyme disease, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, and al…
Largest Catch-Up Initiative Delivers Over 100 Million Childhood Vaccinations
The Big Catch-Up (BCU), a multi-year initiative launched in 2023 by Gavi, WHO, and UNICEF, delivered over 100 million vaccine doses to an estimated 18.3 million children aged 1–5 across 36 countries, with 12.3 million of those children classified as zero-dose.
Notably, 15 million had never received a measles vaccine, and 23 million doses of inactivated polio vaccine were administered. Twelve…