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[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0152676.].

Cholera, although it can kill an adult through dehydration in half a day, is easily treated. Yet in 1992-93, some five hundred people died from cholera in the Orinoco Delta of eastern Venezuela. In some communities, a third of the adults died in a single night, as anthropologist Charles Briggs and Clara Mantini-Briggs, a Venezuelan public health physician, reveal in their frontline report. Why, they ask in this moving and thought-provoking account, did so many die near the end of the twentieth century from a bacterial infection associated with the premodern past? It was evident that the number of deaths resulted not only from inadequacies in medical services but also from the failure of public health officials to inform residents that cholera was likely to arrive. Less evident were the ways that scientists, officials, and politicians connected representations of infectious diseases with images of social inequality. In Venezuela, cholera was racialized as officials used anthropological notions of \"culture\" in deflecting blame away from their institutions and onto the victims themselves. The disease, the space of the Orinoco Delta, and the \"indigenous ethnic group\" who suffered cholera all came to seem somehow synonymous. One of the major threats to people's health worldwide is this deadly cycle of passing the blame. Carefully documenting how stigma, stories, and statistics circulate across borders, this first-rate ethnography demonstrates that the process undermines all the efforts of physicians and public health officials and at the same time contributes catastrophically to epidemics not only of cholera but also of tuberculosis, malaria, AIDS, and other killers. The authors have harnessed their own outrage over what took place during the epidemic and its aftermath in order to make clear the political and human stakes involved in the circulation of narratives, resources, and germs.

During January 26-February 10, 2020, an outbreak of 2019 novel coronavirus disease in an air-conditioned restaurant in Guangzhou, China, involved 3 family clusters. The airflow direction was consistent with droplet transmission. To prevent the spread of the virus in restaurants, we recommend increasing the distance between tables and improving ventilation.

In November 2017, the mobile digital Surveillance Outbreak Response Management and Analysis System was deployed in 30 districts in Nigeria in response to an outbreak of monkeypox. Adaptation and activation of the system took 14 days, and its use improved timeliness, completeness, and overall capacity of the response.

The current outbreak of Ebola in eastern DR Congo, beginning in 2018, emerged in a complex and violent political and security environment. Community-level prevention and outbreak control measures appear to be dependent on public trust in relevant authorities and information, but little scholarship has explored these issues. We aimed to investigate the role of trust and misinformation on individual preventive behaviours during an outbreak of Ebola virus disease (EVD). We surveyed 961 adults between Sept 1 and Sept 16, 2018. We used a multistage sampling design in Beni and Butembo in North Kivu, DR Congo. Of 412 avenues and cells (the lowest administrative structures; 99 in Beni and 313 in Butembo), we randomly selected 30 in each city. In each avenue or cell, 16 households were selected using the WHO Expanded Programme on Immunization's random walk approach. In each household, one adult (aged ≥18 years) was randomly selected for interview. Standardised questionnaires were administered by experienced interviewers. We used multivariate models to examine the intermediate variables of interest, including institutional trust and belief in selected misinformation, with outcomes of interest related to EVD prevention behaviours. Among 961 respondents, 349 (31·9%, 95% CI 27·4–36·9) trusted that local authorities represent their interest. Belief in misinformation was widespread, with 230 (25·5%, 21·7–29·6) respondents believing that the Ebola outbreak was not real. Low institutional trust and belief in misinformation were associated with a decreased likelihood of adopting preventive behaviours, including acceptance of Ebola vaccines (odds ratio 0·22, 95% CI 0·21–0·22, and 1·40, 1·39–1·42) and seeking formal health care (0·06, 0·05–0·06, and 1·16, 1·15–1·17). The findings underscore the practical implications of mistrust and misinformation for outbreak control. These factors are associated with low compliance with messages of social and behavioural change and refusal to seek formal medical care or accept vaccines, which in turn increases the risk of spread of EVD. The Harvard Humanitarian Initiative Innovation Fund.

Highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) H5N1 activity has intensified globally since 2021, increasingly causing mass mortality in wild birds and poultry and incidental infections in mammals 1 – 3 . However, the ecological and virological properties that underscore future mitigation strategies still remain unclear. Using epidemiological, spatial and genomic approaches, we demonstrate changes in the origins of resurgent HPAI H5 and reveal significant shifts in virus ecology and evolution. Outbreak data show key resurgent events in 2016–2017 and 2020–2021, contributing to the emergence and panzootic spread of H5N1 in 2021–2022. Genomic analysis reveals that the 2016–2017 epizootics originated in Asia, where HPAI H5 reservoirs are endemic. In 2020–2021, 2.3.4.4b H5N8 viruses emerged in African poultry, featuring mutations altering HA structure and receptor binding. In 2021–2022, a new H5N1 virus evolved through reassortment in wild birds in Europe, undergoing further reassortment with low-pathogenic avian influenza in wild and domestic birds during global dissemination. These results highlight a shift in the HPAI H5 epicentre beyond Asia and indicate that increasing persistence of HPAI H5 in wild birds is facilitating geographic and host range expansion, accelerating dispersion velocity and increasing reassortment potential. As earlier outbreaks of H5N1 and H5N8 were caused by more stable genomic constellations, these recent changes reflect adaptation across the domestic-bird–wild-bird interface. Elimination strategies in domestic birds therefore remain a high priority to limit future epizootics. Recent resurgences of highly pathogenic avian influenza H5 viruses have different origins and virus ecologies as their epicentres shift and viruses evolve, with changes indicating increased adaptation among domestic birds.

Mpox is an infectious disease caused by the monkeypox virus (MPXV), closely related to the virus that causes smallpox. In May 2022, cases of mpox were reported in previously non-endemic countries including Canada. To summarize the epidemiology of the mpox outbreak in Canada, as well as key public health response activities, between April and December 2022. The Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) worked closely with local, provincial and territorial public health authorities to develop national case investigation and reporting tools, including national case definitions for confirmed and probable mpox cases. Based on de-identified case data submitted to PHAC, patterns and trends were examined, including the distribution of cases by sociodemographic, clinical and transmission factors. Overall, 1,474 mpox cases (1,396 confirmed, 78 probable) were reported to PHAC. All reported cases were associated with MPXV clade IIb. Mpox disproportionately affected gay, bisexual and other men who have sex with men (80.0%) and those between 20-49 years of age (86.0%). Available data suggests that the most likely mode of disease acquisition was through sexual contact, with limited evidence on other possible modes of transmission. Some cases were hospitalized (3.0%); however, there were no mpox-related deaths in Canada. Rapid coordination and surveillance activities supported the timely implementation of tailored interventions, including the procurement and distribution of vaccines. These actions, coupled with vaccination uptake and behavioural changes, contributed to reducing transmission and health impacts of mpox on the Canadian population.

The 2014 chikungunya outbreak in the Dominican Republic resulted in intense local transmission, with high postoutbreak seroprevalence. The resulting population immunity will likely minimize risk for another large outbreak through 2035, but changes in population behavior or environmental conditions or emergence of different virus strains could lead to increased transmission.

After 3 cases of Corynebacterium diphtheriae infection associated with intravenous drug use among persons experiencing homelessness (PEH) were reported to the Health Protection Authority in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, in 2023, we examined pathogen spread among PEH. Furthermore, we investigated a possible link with the 2022 outbreak of diphtheria in Europe. From swab samples collected during August-November 2023 from 36 PEH and cutaneous lesions, we detected 3 additional cases of cutaneous toxigenic C. diphtheriae. Sequence type 574 was identified in 5 case-isolates and is genetically associated with 1 of the predominant clusters in identified in the 2022 outbreak. Our findings demonstrate the need for increased detection and monitoring of cutaneous diphtheria and boosting immunity against diphtheria in groups with increased risk for infection. Genomic analyses are valuable for identifying genetic relationships between outbreaks, even when epidemiologic data are scarce.

We report a large-scale outbreak of Mycoplasma pneumoniae respiratory infections encompassing 218 cases (0.8% of 26,449 patients tested) during 2023-2024 in Marseille, France. The bacterium is currently circulating and primarily affects children <15 years of age. High prevalence of co-infections warrants the use of a syndromic diagnostic strategy.