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India Moves Closer to Dengue Vaccine as Final Trials Underway

Patients suffering from dengue fever receive medical treatment at Civil Hospital in Karachi, Pakistan, 05 November 2025. EPA/SHAHZAIB AKBER
Patients suffering from dengue fever receive medical treatment at Civil Hospital in Karachi, Pakistan, 05 November 2025. EPA/SHAHZAIB AKBER
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India Moves Closer to Dengue Vaccine as Final Trials Underway

Patients suffering from dengue fever receive medical treatment at Civil Hospital in Karachi, Pakistan, 05 November 2025. EPA/SHAHZAIB AKBER
Patients suffering from dengue fever receive medical treatment at Civil Hospital in Karachi, Pakistan, 05 November 2025. EPA/SHAHZAIB AKBER

As dengue surges globally, an Indian vaccine candidate has entered the final stage of testing, raising hopes for one of the world's first single-dose shots against the deadly mosquito-borne disease.

Dengue, which causes severe flu-like symptoms and debilitating body aches, has exploded globally, fueled by rising temperatures and densely populated cities.

The World Health Organization (WHO) says that almost half the world's population is now at risk, with 100-400 million infections every year. India alone has recorded over one million cases and at least 1,500 deaths since 2021.

Hoping to stem the global epidemic, Panacea Biotec has begun final Phase III trials of its vaccine, DengiAll, which has been pursuing for nearly 15 years.

More than 10,000 volunteers across the country are enrolled in the study, overseen by the Indian Council of Medical Research, with the vaccine on track for rollout as early as next year if the trial results are favorable.

"We will try to get this vaccine out there as soon as possible," Syed Khalid Ali, chief scientific officer of Panacea, told AFP in New Delhi.

Doctor Ekta Gupta, professor of clinical virology at the Institute of Liver and Biliary Sciences in New Delhi, said dengue was now considered hyperendemic in India, with all four virus serotypes circulating simultaneously.

"This vaccine is very much needed right now to control the occurrence of these cases, or at least prevent the severity."

- Climate change -

Monsoon outbreaks regularly push Indian hospitals to their limits, crowding urban wards and leaving rural regions grappling with late diagnoses and poor access to care.

Higher temperatures and changing rainfall patterns create ideal conditions for Aedes mosquitoes -- the vectors of dengue -- to reproduce and spread the virus.

Children are particularly vulnerable to the more severe form, called dengue hemorrhagic fever, as they are more likely to suffer low platelet counts and shock.

Participants in Phase III trials, which started in 2024, were randomly assigned to receive either the vaccine or a placebo, with the results expected later this year.

Vaccines against all four dengue serotypes have long posed a scientific challenge. Immunity to one strain does not protect against others, and secondary infections can be more severe.

Most existing candidates require multiple doses.

If approved, DengiAll would become one of the world's first single-dose dengue vaccines, following Brazil's approval of a similar shot last year.

It would also be the first such vaccine available in India, where no dengue shot is currently licensed for public use.

"We will be the second (single-dose) vaccine to come out... But in India and several lower-middle-income countries, we will be the first ones to roll out the dengue vaccine," Ali said.

The candidate is based on a tetravalent strain originally developed by the US National Institutes of Health.

- 'Hope for future' -

Panacea is the most advanced of three Indian firms licensed to use the strain, having developed its own formulation and secured a process patent.

Inside the company's research labs, doctor Priyanka Priyadarsiny, head of biological R&D, said vaccine development involves several steps, from proof-of-concept studies to regulatory checks.

"We are extremely cautious about purity, safety and adverse effects," she said. "Only after meeting regulatory specifications can a product be considered safe for public use."

At present, the WHO recommends only one dengue vaccine, Qdenga, produced by Japan's Takeda for children aged six to 16 in high-transmission settings.

Qdenga, which requires two doses administered three months apart, is not currently available in India.

Ali said DengiAll could be given to people aged one to 60 and is expected to offer long-term protection.

In India, final approval would come from the Drug Controller General of India, while WHO prequalification would be required for large-scale international use.

Experts say a successful Indian-made vaccine could be key to affordability and mass rollout in lower-income countries.

Virologist and Oxford University fellow Shahid Jameel -- who is not connected with the trial -- warned dengue incidence could rise by 50-75 percent by 2050 under current climate change trends.

Still, he cautioned that only Phase III results would determine whether a candidate meets the criteria for a safe and effective dengue vaccine.

"Phase III testing and follow-up are needed to show if the above conditions are met," he told AFP.

"Only then can we have a useful dengue vaccine. It is still early days, but there is hope for the future."

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Egypt Calls for Preserving Migration Routes for Birds

Migratory birds in Sinai. Asharq Al-Awsat
Migratory birds in Sinai. Asharq Al-Awsat
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Egypt Calls for Preserving Migration Routes for Birds

Migratory birds in Sinai. Asharq Al-Awsat
Migratory birds in Sinai. Asharq Al-Awsat

Egypt has reaffirmed the importance of protecting migratory birds as the country marked World Migratory Bird Day, holding activities under the slogan “Every bird counts... your observation matters” to raise environmental awareness.

Minister of Local Development and Environment Manal Awad said Egypt represents one of the world’s most important migration corridors due to its strategic geographic location linking Europe and Africa.

Millions of birds pass through the country annually during seasonal migration periods, she stated.

According to Awad, Egypt’s coastal areas and wetlands serve as vital resting and feeding stations for migratory birds. So, she stressed the importance of nature reserves in protecting these habitats and supporting biodiversity conservation.

She also highlighted several key sites for migratory birds, including the Zaranik, Ashtoum El-Gamil, and Burullus reserves along the Mediterranean coast, in addition to Ras Mohammed and the northern Red Sea islands.

Awad pointed to the winter migratory bird census project, implemented in cooperation with the Egyptian Environmental Affairs Agency (EEAA) and the Nature Conservation Egypt association, which provides scientific data on bird populations and species diversity.

The ministry said its conservation efforts include issuing annual hunting regulations and conducting campaigns to remove illegal bird-catching nets from protected areas.

Approximately 18 kilometers of illegal nets have been removed from the Ashtoum El-Gamil and Burullus reserves.

Varieties

'Ghost of the Forest' Returns to Kenya as Conservationists Reintroduce Rare Antelope into the Wild

Critically endangered mountain bongos feed in a forest enclosure at the Mount Kenya Wildlife Conservancy in Nanyuki, Laikipia County, Kenya, Saturday, May 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Brian Inganga)
Critically endangered mountain bongos feed in a forest enclosure at the Mount Kenya Wildlife Conservancy in Nanyuki, Laikipia County, Kenya, Saturday, May 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Brian Inganga)
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'Ghost of the Forest' Returns to Kenya as Conservationists Reintroduce Rare Antelope into the Wild

Critically endangered mountain bongos feed in a forest enclosure at the Mount Kenya Wildlife Conservancy in Nanyuki, Laikipia County, Kenya, Saturday, May 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Brian Inganga)
Critically endangered mountain bongos feed in a forest enclosure at the Mount Kenya Wildlife Conservancy in Nanyuki, Laikipia County, Kenya, Saturday, May 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Brian Inganga)

The mountain bongo has become the ghost of the forest, hard to spot amid the dense shrubs due to its ability to camouflage.

A critically endangered species, the animal is being slowly reintroduced into the wild by conservationists to increase the number of the rare antelope that are indigenous to Kenya’s forests.

The mountain bongo is a rare antelope known for its brown skin and distinct white stripes. With fewer than 100 individuals left in the wild, a conservancy based in Kenya is breeding them and slowly reintroducing them into the wild, with a target of 750 wild bongos by 2050, The AP news reported.

Located on the misty slopes of Kenya’s highest mountain, Mount Kenya, and on the edge of the forest, the 1,250-acre Mount Kenya Wildlife Conservancy in the Nanyuki area has been restoring the survival instincts of zoo-bred bongos. They want to ensure the animals can feed without human assistance, escape from predators, and build a strong immunity against diseases in the wild.

Last week, the conservancy imported a new batch of four male bongos from the European Association of Zoos and Aquaria though the Czech Republic. These new arrivals, currently quarantined and under constant observation, will interbreed with descendants of 18 bongos that arrived at the conservancy in 2004 from the United States to ensure a more diverse genetic pool.

The conservancy’s head, Dr. Robert Aruho, says inbreeding among bongos with similar genes is discouraged while rebuilding the population of this critically endangered species.

“We want bongos that are not only strong in body, but strong in the genes they pass to the next generation,” he said.

Bongos are native to Kenya’s Mount Kenya, Aberdare, Eburu and Mau forests, which play a key role in protecting the forests that are vital to the country’s water supply.

The last wild bongo was spotted in the Mount Kenya forest in 1994 before the conservancy reintroduced the first 10 bongos to the wild in 2022. Today, they roam among the orange climber vines and shrubs that form part of their favorite plants.

The bongo population dwindled after thousands of them died in disease outbreaks in the 1960s. In the 1980s, conservationist Don Hunt exported 36 of the species to the U.S. as insurance to be bred in captivity, with a plan to return them to the wild when conditions improved.

When the Mount Kenya Wildlife Conservancy was opened in 2004, 18 descendants of these bongos were imported and have since interbred, bringing the conservancy’s population to 102 bongos.

Caroline Makena, 33, grew up in the Mount Kenya region and remembers hearing stories about bongos from her grandmother, who said they were her community’s favorite bush meat. However, Makena never got to see one until she came to work as a gardener at the conservancy.

“I never knew the bongos were this beautiful, and I think my community loved them not just for the meat but because of their beauty,” she said.

The bongos are shy and can camouflage despite their distinct white stripes, and these attributes are critical for their survival in the wild.

Andrew Mulani, the bongo program assistant at the conservancy, said the bongos are monitored for months before being reintroduced into the wild to ensure that the shyest ones are selected because docile animals would fall easily to predators.

His most fulfilling moment was when the fourth calf was born in the wild last year, an indication that the bongos are thriving in their native habitat and that their population will certainly increase.

Bongos have a gestation period of nine months, a factor that has negatively impacted their slow population growth. They are also sensitive and react to some plants and weather conditions compared to other species in the antelope family that thrive in the same ecosystem.

As the team of conservationists in Mount Kenya races to save the critically endangered species, supplementing the bongos’ shrub diet with special nutritious pellets, thousands of tourists who visit the conservancy annually marvel at their spiraled horns, hoping the ghost of the forest will become a more common sight in Kenya’s forests.

Varieties

Trump is Lifting Restrictions on Hunting in National Parks, Refuges and Wilderness Areas

FILE - Cypress trees grow in a swamps in the Barataria Preserve, part of Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve in Marrero, La., June 3, 2018. (AP Photo/Beth J. Harpaz, File)
FILE - Cypress trees grow in a swamps in the Barataria Preserve, part of Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve in Marrero, La., June 3, 2018. (AP Photo/Beth J. Harpaz, File)
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Trump is Lifting Restrictions on Hunting in National Parks, Refuges and Wilderness Areas

FILE - Cypress trees grow in a swamps in the Barataria Preserve, part of Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve in Marrero, La., June 3, 2018. (AP Photo/Beth J. Harpaz, File)
FILE - Cypress trees grow in a swamps in the Barataria Preserve, part of Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve in Marrero, La., June 3, 2018. (AP Photo/Beth J. Harpaz, File)

President Donald Trump's administration is quietly pushing national park, refuge and wilderness area managers to dramatically scale back hunting restrictions, raising questions about visitor safety and the impact on wildlife.

US Department of the Interior Secretary Doug Burgum issued an order in January directing multiple agencies to remove what he termed “unnecessary regulatory or administrative barriers” to hunting and fishing and justify regulations they want to keep in place.

“Expanding opportunities for the public to hunt and fish on Department-managed lands not only strengthens conservation outcomes, but also supports rural economies, public health, and access to America's outdoor spaces,” Burgum wrote. “The Department's policy is clear: public and federally managed lands should be open to hunting and fishing unless a specific, documented, and legally supported exception applies.”

Order clears the way for tree stands, training dogs and more The order applies to 55 sites in the lower 48 states under the National Park Service's jurisdiction, according to the National Parks Conservation Association. Managers at various locations have already lifted prohibitions on hunting stands that damage trees and training hunting dogs, using vehicles to retrieve animals and hunting along trails, according to an NPCA review of site regulations the organization recently performed after learning of the order. The New York Times was the first to report on the changes.

The hunting season in the Cape Cod National Seashore in Massachusetts, for example, would be extended through the spring and summer. Hunters in the Lake Meredith National Recreation Area in Texas would be allowed to clean their kills in bathrooms. And hunters would be allowed to kill alligators in the Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve in Louisiana.

An effort to save hunting? Burgum’s order comes as hunting continues to decline in the face of increasing urbanization. Only about 4.2% of the US population identified as a hunter older than 16 in 2024, according to US Fish and Wildlife Service and US Census data, leaving state wildlife agencies short on revenue from license sales and excise taxes on guns and ammunition.

Hunting advocates and conservative policymakers have been exploring multiple avenues to keep hunting alive, including promoting the sport to women and young children, creating seasons for more species and expanding hunter access to public land.

Hunting is currently allowed across about 51 million National Park Service acres spanning 76 sites, although only about 8 million of those acres lie in the contiguous United States with the rest in Alaska, according to the NPS website. Fishing is allowed in 213 sites. NPS sites typically adopt state hunting and fishing regulations although they can impose restrictions that go beyond them to protect public safety and wildlife resources, like prohibiting shooting along a trail or near buildings.

‘I’d love to know the problem we're trying to solve' Dan Wenk, a former Yellowstone National Park superintendent and NPS deputy operations director, said park managers established their regulations by talking with stakeholders and, as a result, most of the restrictions have been widely accepted. He said it makes no sense for the Trump administration to upend that structure without substantial public discussion.

“Process never seems to stand in the way of many things with this administration,” Wenk said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press. “This was never a big issue. I'd love to know the problem we're trying to solve. Then I could understand the costs that it's going to take to solve it in terms of resources and visitor safety.”

FILE - People fish on Race Point Beach, part of Cape Cod National Seashore, May 25, 2020, in Provincetown, Mass. (AP Photo/Michael Dwyer, File)

Interior Department spokesperson Elizabeth Peace said in an email that the order is a “commonsense approach to public land management" and promised that any closures or limits needed for public safety, resource protection or legal compliance will remain in place.

“For decades, sportsmen and women have been some of the strongest stewards of our public lands," she said, “and this order ensures their access is not unnecessarily restricted by outdated or overly broad limitations that are not required by law.”

Asked in a follow-up email about the extent of any public outreach efforts, if any, Peace said only that the department had given the AP its statement on the order.

Hunting groups applaud the order The Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, which works to preserve access for hunting and fishing, posted a statement online in January calling the order a balance between wildlife management and outdoor traditions hunters and anglers support. Ducks Unlimited posted a statement in March saying Burgum's order recognizes duck hunters' “vital role.”

“This process will streamline federal regulations, make them more consistent with existing state rules, and provide more public-land access for outdoor recreation. Thank you, Secretary Burgum, for prioritizing America’s hunters and anglers," the statement said.

Elaine Leslie, former head of the NPS' biological resources department, said Trump is undermining a process that was put in place in good faith and the order does not reflect science-based management.

“I don't want to take my young grandchildren to a park unit only to have a hunter drag a gutted elk they shot across a visitor center parking lot. Nor enter a restroom where hunters are cleaning their game,” Leslie said in a text to the AP. "There is a time and place for hunting, trapping and fishing ... but that doesn't mean every place has to be open to every activity especially at the expense of others and degrading our public resources.”