Zebra Mail · Issue #2 · 6 November 2026

The Weekly Dose, 6 Nov 2026

US$40 HIV jabs, volcano teeth and bat-jamming moths.

Cheaper HIV prevention, an island milestone and moths with a defence.

🩺 The Weekly Dose

The FDA tentatively approved a generic of the twice-yearly HIV-prevention jab lenacapavir: US$40 a year, for 120 lower-income countries. The US price tops US$28,000. MSF notes 26 countries miss out.
Barbados has eliminated mother-to-child HIV transmission: no new infant infections from 2022 to 2024. 98% tested, 98% treated. Unglamorous, relentless, effective.
Women starting modern HRT at 45–59 had no more heart attacks, strokes or clots than matched non-users over about 12 years (52,330 women). Observational abstract, not peer reviewed. The menopause wars continue.

Newborn deaths in Flint, Michigan, halved after cash support in pregnancy and infancy: 10.2 to 5.1 per 1,000 births. Birth and death records, 2021–25, JAMA Pediatrics. Led by Dr Mona Hanna, who runs the program. Write-up Why it's interesting: a non-medical fix moved a hard outcome. Association only.
Women with longer reproductive lifespans had less small-vessel disease on brain MRI at 70. Longitudinal cohort, 352 Swedish women, Neurology. Led by Giulia Lorenzon and Anna Marseglia. Write-up Why it's interesting: it links lifetime oestrogen to brain vessels. Association, not cause.
A resting-brain scan pattern, trained on super-agers versus Alzheimer's, flagged later decline in cognitively normal adults. Machine-learning fMRI study, 1,300+ adults, Science Advances. Write-up Why it's interesting: it beat amyloid and tau markers. Not a clinical test.

Hawkmoths have evolved genital ultrasound to jam bat sonar up to seven separate times. Evolution kept having the same idea. Nobody stopped it.
Earwax defeats ants: it soaks up the droplets that let their feet hold 60 times their body weight. Your ears have been running free pest control.
Teeth from an English Quaker cemetery link childhood vitamin D deficiency to volcanoes and a dim sun. Thirty teeth; Dr Ellen Kendall led. Industrial smog now has co-accused.

8 Nov: International Day of Radiology: Röntgen found X-rays on this day in 1895. 🧩 themed puzzles
12 Nov: World Pneumonia Day: a leading killer of young children. 🧩 themed puzzles
14 Nov: World Diabetes Day: Frederick Banting's birthday. 🧩 themed puzzles
17 Nov: World Cervical Cancer Elimination Day: the first cancer we could eliminate. 🧩 themed puzzles
18–24 Nov: World AMR Awareness Week: antibiotics are running out of road. 🧩 themed puzzles

The newborn Apgar score came from an anaesthetist. Dr Virginia Apgar presented it in 1952, after being steered away from surgery.

Sat 7 Nov, Medical Physics Day: Physics-in-the-clinic Triviosis, Einstein Opacitis and Cryptogenic #3.
Sun 8 Nov, Radiology Day: Grand Rounds #4, plus Normie Grand Rounds: the week that was.
Mon 9 Nov, ECG: A 46-year-old woman's heart 'skips' with her work coffee.
Wed 11 Nov: Super Zebritis, five prompts, incl. "Name a condition called 'trench ___'".
Thu 12 Nov, ECG: A 66-year-old woman on haemodialysis missed two sessions and feels weak, with palpitations. Plus Einstein Dxtective.
Fri 13 Nov: Long Friday Wordemic, eight letters, and Einstein Anatomegaly.

Malady Wise / Think like a doctor.

General education, not personal medical advice.