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Good morning and happy Monday. Lots of infectious disease reading today, and some political movement, too. I hope your coffee is ready.
Marty Makary out as FDA commissioner?
President Trump has signed off on a plan to dismiss FDA Commissioner Marty Makary, according to multiple reports on Friday. It would be the latest high-profile departure to hit Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s health department. Having served in the role for a little over a year, Makary had an ambitious, if tumultuous tenure.
The plans could change, but little things read like a sign of the end times for Makary: On Friday, he was supposed to give an address at an annual 5K race before running with staff. Makary was a no-show, two agency sources told STAT’s Lizzy Lawrence. Read more on the latest.
Deadline looms for Supreme Court on mifepristone
In other, not unrelated FDA news: After issuing a week-long pause on a federal appeals court decision to stop mail orders of the abortion medication mifepristone, the Supreme Court is expected to take further steps in the case by the end of today. How this plays out could have a major impact on the regulatory authority of the FDA as well as on abortion providers and patients.
States have the legal authority to regulate abortion — but the FDA regulates drugs, and in 2023 the agency officially removed the requirement that mifepristone can only be dispensed in-person. Former FDA leaders, the pharma lobby, and more than two dozen legal experts submitted amicus briefs last week arguing that the FDA used sound science to change the rules around mifepristone and should maintain its regulatory power. Read more from me on the implications of the case and what could happen today.
How the conspiracy ecosystem jumped on hantavirus
Epidemiologist Katrine Wallace has built a large social media audience by debunking medical misinformation in real time. Now, her followers are so good at identifying false information that they’re often the ones alerting her to something that needs debunking. The latest incident? People claiming that ivermectin could be effective against the hantavirus.
“At this point, the speed of it barely surprises me anymore,” Wallace writes in a new First Opinion essay. “The actual facts of the outbreak almost immediately became secondary.”
Since the Covid pandemic, the steps for disseminating misinformation online seem to have solidified and accelerated. Read more from Wallace on how the conspiracy ecosystem has morphed over the years.
A rare animal disease among European gay men
Dermatophilosis is a skin disease, triggered by a bacterium, that normally infects livestock. But in France and Spain, researchers have diagnosed the condition in a number of men who have sex with other men with no known exposure to affected animals. Across Europe, more than 25 cases have been confirmed.
In some ways, it’s reminiscent of the 2022 emergence of mpox among gay men, but so far this disease is a much milder experience, STAT’s Helen Branswell reports. Sometimes called “rain rot” or “strawberry foot rot,” the disease’s primary symptom is a rash. “The question’s going to be: What does that mean in the real, clinical world?” Demetre Daskalakis, former HIV prevention leader at the CDC, told Helen. Read more on the situation.
400
That’s how many diapers some families in California will soon receive when they’re discharged from the hospitals after birth, according to a Friday announcement from Governor Gavin Newsom. For the average baby, that works out to around a month’s worth of supplies. The program will launch in the next fiscal year at 65 to 75 hospitals that serve low-income patients and perform a quarter of births in the state. California joins Tennessee and Delaware as the third state with a free diaper program. The AP has more.
The connection between periods and mental health
People with conditions like premenstrual syndrome or premenstrual dysphoric disorder are more likely to suffer from psychiatric disorders — and vice versa — according to a study published Friday in JAMA Network Open.
Researchers analyzed data from a Swedish registry of more than 3.6 million women from 2001 through 2022, matching the records of those with premenstrual disorders to their unaffected biological sisters as well as 10 more unaffected controls. About 105,000 people had PMD diagnoses, 48% of whom had a previous psych diagnosis, compared to nearly 30% of controls. The pattern was seen the other way, too: 37% of those with psychiatric diagnoses later received a PMD diagnosis, versus 21% of those without.
The risk pattern was strongest for depression and anxiety, but also present for ADHD, bipolar disorder, and personality disorders. Previous research has hinted at these associations, but studies are small and often have short follow-up periods. It’s possible that both genetics and the biological mechanisms around hormones and neurology play a role in these connections. As usual, more research is needed.
What we’re reading
- US FTC’s investigation of trans youth care was ‘retaliatory,’ judge says, Reuters
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In California governor race, single-payer is a litmus test. There’s still no way to pay for it, KFF Health News
- Opinion: AI doctors should be licensed. Here’s a framework to do that, STAT
- What happened on the hantavirus cruise, according to a doctor on board, The Atlantic
- Opinion: RFK Jr. allegedly ‘collected’ a dead raccoon’s penis. Was it bioethically justifiable? STAT