Feature Stories

Responding to a yellow fever outbreak in Nigeria amidst a global pandemic

In early November 2020, positive samples for yellow fever were reported from five Nigerian states. Nigeria is a high-risk country for yellow fever and is a priority country for the global eliminate yellow fever epidemics (EYE) strategy. The re-emergence of the virus there in September 2017 has been marked by outbreaks throughout the country. 

Wow wow wow: A club way to teach young people about drug resistance

Glorious Erhuanga is rarely ill, she says. Which is a good thing because she does not care much for medical drugs. And because, by her own admission, she is an abuser of drugs. “I do abuse drugs in the sense that I don’t completely do the course. If you feel strong enough, you stop. But your illness is not gone completely, they [pathogens] hide in your body,” she explains.

Turning the unknown into common knowledge in the race to limit antimicrobial resista...

Vanessa Carter nearly lost her face to antibiotic resistance.

She likely acquired a bacterial infection while in hospital during one of many complicated facial surgeries. None of the many doctors she had in the first six years of those surgeries ever mentioned antibiotic resistance to her. Because she was oblivious to the dangers of stopping an antibiotic drug or even an antibiotic ointment after a couple days when it appeared to not be working, she sees herself as part of the complication – back then. 

Now, she is a force for common knowledge.