A devastating incident involving contaminated milk has been reported from Rajamahendravaram, Andhra Pradesh. The first major reports appeared on 28 February 2026, indicating that this incident had claimed 5 lives and left at least 14 others hospitalized after they consumed contaminated milk. Local authorities in the East Godavari district traced the outbreak to a single unauthorized milk vendor operating in the Lalacheruvu area. Investigations suggest that the milk became toxic due to a chemical leak within a refrigeration unit. Specifically, officials suspect that ethylene glycol—an industrial coolant—seeped into the storage containers used by the vendor and mixed with stored milk. While common adulterants like urea typically cause health issues after prolonged use, ethylene glycol is far more aggressive, triggering severe complications and acute renal failure within just 3–4 days. The victims reportedly suffered from abdominal pain, anuria and had acute kidney injury shortly after consumption.

The vendor reportedly procured milk from dozens of farmers and supplied it to over 100 households. Following the cluster of deaths, the dairy unit was immediately sealed, and the vendor was detained by the police. A criminal case, on charges of murder, has been registered under Section 103(1) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita. District authorities confirmed that epidemio-logical data strongly link all affected individuals to the supply by this vendor. To confirm the exact cause, specimens of the milk and the cooling equipment have been dispatched to the Forensic Science Laboratory in Vijayawada for detailed toxicological analysis.

Final legal proceedings and the conclusions of the investigation are pending the arrival of the forensic results and official post-mortem reports. This tragic event once again highlights the grave risks associated with unregulated food supply chains and the critical need for maintaining industrial cooling systems.

ALLADI MOHAN, Tirupati, Andhra Pradesh

ORCID iD: 0000-0002-3214-9884

In February 2026, a jury in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas in Pennsylvania, USA, found Johnson & Johnson liable in a lawsuit alleging that prolonged use of its talc-based baby powder contributed to ovarian cancer in a woman from Pennsylvania. The jury awarded damages amounting to US$ 250 000 to the plaintiff’s family.

The case involved Gayle Emerson, who filed the lawsuit in 2019 after being diagnosed with ovarian cancer. Emerson reportedly used Johnson’s Baby Powder regularly for more than four decades beginning in the late 1960s. She was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2015 and subsequently initiated legal proceedings alleging that long-term exposure to the talc-based product had contributed to the development of the disease.Emerson died in 2019 at the age of 68 years due to complications related to ovarian cancer. The legal proceedings were subsequently continued by her children.

According to the jury verdict, the damages included US$ 50 000 as compensatory damages and US$ 200 000 as punitive damages. Attorneys representing the Emerson family stated that the verdict reflected the jury’s finding regarding the company’s liability in the case.

Johnson & Johnson has maintained that its talc-based baby powder is safe and that scientific evidence does not establish a causal association between cosmetic talc use and ovarian cancer. Following the verdict, the company stated that it intends to appeal. The company has also stated that decades of testing and regulatory reviews have not demonstrated the presence of asbestos in its cosmetic talc products.

The verdict is one among a large number of legal claims filed in the USA concerning the company’s talc-based products. More than 67 000 lawsuits have been filed by consumers and their families alleging that long-term use of talc-based baby powder was associated with ovarian cancer or mesothelioma. The company has consistently disputed these claims.

The litigation has also influenced commercial decisions relating to the product. In 2020, Johnson & Johnson discontinued the sale of its talc-based baby powder in the USA and Canada, citing declining demand and the broader litigation environment. The company later announced plans to discontinue talc-based baby powder globally and to transition to cornstarch-based formulations.

The Pennsylvania verdict adds to the continuing scrutiny of talc-containing consumer products and highlights ongoing debates regarding long-term product safety assessment, regulatory oversight, and corporate accountability in widely used personal care products.

NISCHAL P.M., Mysuru, Karnataka

ORCID iD: 0000-0003-3491-5500

In a major public health initiative towards prevention and elimination of cervical cancer, the human papilloma virus (HPV) vaccination program was launched in India on 28 February 2026. The initial phase of this program involves the rollout of nationwide, free single-dose HPV vaccination targeting nearly 12 million girls aged 14 years. During this 90-day vaccination drive, HPV vaccines have been made available free of cost at government health facilities, and daily vaccination is being done to maximize coverage. Of the available bivalent, quadrivalent and nonavalent HPV vaccines, India’s immunization program is at present administering the Gardasil quadrivalent vaccine in a single-dose schedule, with expected 93%–100% effectiveness against the specific HPV types.

With this, India joins the group of over 160 countries that have incorporated HPV vaccination in their national immunization schedule and is among the 90 countries that have adopted the single-dose vaccine schedule for improved coverage, affordability, and better program efficiency. It also aligns with the WHOs call for elimination of cervical cancer by the 90-70-90 strategy, i.e., 90% girls vaccinated by the age of 15 years; 70% of women screened by a high-performance test by the age of 35 years; and 90% of women with cervical cancer or pre-cancer receive treatment.

Cervical cancer is the fourth most common cancer in women globally. In India, it is the second most common cancer among women, with nearly 120 000 reported new cases and 80 000 deaths annually. For decades, it has been a tragic and preventable killer of women. A landmark breakthrough in the fight against cervical cancer was the discovery of HPV as the causative organism by the German virologist Harald zur Hausen in 1983, which won him the Nobel prize in 2008. It was not until 2006 that the first HPV vaccine was approved in the USA. In India, the bivalent and quadrivalent HPV vaccines were licensed for use in 2008. However, vaccine use remained limited for more than a decade because of affordability, accessibility, myths, and misinformation. The conventional vaccination schedule for HPV vaccines has been 2 doses, 6 months apart, for girls aged 14 years, and three doses for girls/women over the age of 15 years. In late 2022, the WHO endorsed the single-dose schedule as an effective and advantageous option for wider coverage through public health programs.

Inclusion in the national immunization program and a feasible single-dose schedule give a definite and much-needed boost to preventive coverage of the target population.

JYOTI NATH MODI, Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh

ORCID iD: 0000-0002-0626-1637

In January 2026, a child with Niemann-Pick disease type C was treated with an antisense oligonucleotide (ASO) produced by Everyone Medicines, at the Great Ormond Street Hospital in London, UK, as part of a trial looking to make the use of such individualized therapies routine. The permission for this trial, which will include 9 more children with severe neuro-degenerative conditions, was achieved after extensive lobbying by Julia Vitarello and others led to a change in the rules by Britain’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency. Genomics England, which is a government-owned entity involved in genetic sequencing data to recognize genetic disorders, Mila’s Miracle Foundation, and Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency have been working with experts at Oxford University via the Rare Therapies Launch Pad since 2023, to set protocols and guidelines to standardize assessment, collect data and to process approval for use of such personalized treatments through trials. The amended regulations now also have master protocols in place for increased production of such medications at more financially viable costs. This British protocol pathway has been shared with counterparts in the USA in the Food and Drug Administration department as well. In Europe, 1 Mutation Medicine is an academic group working to advance ASO-based treatments at economical costs.

One such customized drug therapy is the ASO molecule, which works in disorders like Niemann-Pick disease type C, by binding to and altering the function of mRNA in human cells.Niemann-Pick disease, which has a genetic mutation as its cause, sees patients suffer from refractory epileptic attacks, cognitive and learning difficulties, memory loss and muscular atonia. The ASO agent, which is now commercially available as the drug Avasen, has come to fruition due to the relentless efforts of Julia Vitarello, who in 2021 lost her daughter Mila Makovec, aged 10 years, to an ultra-rare neurodegenerative disorder. Initially setting up a platform called Mila’s Miracle Foundation while her daughter was alive, Ms Vitarello focused on continuing collaborations with physicians at Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, USA, after Mila’s demise, to research, develop and fund such treatments for other patients. Once the ASO molecule was discovered, she launched a biotech company, Everyone Medicines, to streamline production of such customized treatments.

Rare disease day, earmarked for the last day of February, focuses on the estimated 3.5%–5.9% of the world’s population affected by rare (less than 1 in 2000 people affected; definitions vary, but this is the European definition) and ultra-rare (less than 1 in 50 000 people affected) disorders. Programs focusing on research into individualizing treatment modalities for such patients are often led by parents who have children suffering from, or have lost children to, such rare diseases.

In India, the National Policy for Rare Diseases has recognized Centres of Excellence to diagnose and treat rare diseases and has allocated `299 crores (2 billion) of government funds for 2025–26 for the treatment of such rare diseases. A majority of the sum is as-yet unutilized at the time of this report. A ceiling of `50 lakhs (5 million) per patient is set as the upper limit of government-financed support for treatment of such conditions. Organizations such as the Rare Disease India Foundation and Lysosomal Storage Disorders Society argue that cessation of customized treatments (which are prohibitively expensive) once `50 lakhs (5 million) cap is reached is deleterious to the health of the patients, many of whom show improvements with the medications and then rapidly deteriorate once the therapies are stopped. An urgent need for legal intervention by the Supreme Court of India has been suggested to ensure continuation of therapy with expanded financial aid from the government, increased disease-specific research into cost-comprehensive and subsidized therapies to reduce the cost involved, and to have higher volumes of production of individualized therapies, which at present take 2–3 years to manufacture.

MAHARRA HUSSAIN, United Arab Emirates

ORCID iD: 0000-0001-7632-0631

A recent study by the Mumbai-based non-governmental organization (NGO) Debabrata Mitalee Auro Foundation (DAF) has shown that 9 in 10 doctors in India would discourage their children from pursuing the medical profession. The study involved 1208 doctors in cities and towns across India and was conducted over a period of 6 months.

The phenomenon of ‘occupational inheritance’ is well explored in the domain of medicine, with Swedish observational studies citing nearly a 3-fold increase in the number of physicians with physician parents over a span of 30 years. Increased exposure to the discipline, better socioeconomic status, similar social networks, and many other such factors are likely driving forces in the heritability of the profession.

What explains the finding that Indian physicians now discourage their offspring from pursuing the same careers? The answer seems to be multifactorial. The DAF study found that 84% of doctors expected to be physically assaulted by patients and/or family members in the workplace, 78% reported high burnout levels, 67% have been involved in a medicolegal complaint, and 29% reported experiencing depression because of events in the workplace.

Similar notions are being echoed overseas. The Doctors Company survey of 5000 physicians in the USA highlighted that 9 of 10 physicians did not want their children to go into medicine, and 43% were contemplating retirement in the next 5 years. In the UK, the 2024 National Health System Staff Survey reported that 30.24% of doctors felt burnt out from their work, while the 2025 General Medical Council Workplace Experiences Report noted that 63% regularly worked beyond rostered hours. These challenging conditions have spurred current physicians to reconsider their future ands well as their children’s futures in the profession.

In a vocation where the average employee is overworked and underpaid, the current trend burdens an already overstretched healthcare system and threatens the safety of medical practice and the quality of patient care provided.

The DAF study advocates for several system-wide reforms, including improved mental health support services to tackle psychological stressors, better legal frameworks, and organizational security to prevent violence and harassment, and increased public education campaigns to update their perceptions of the profession. India’s healthcare industry will have to action these changes to ensure that the supply of future physicians meets their ever-increasing demand.

SAHIL SHAH, Wales, United Kingdom

ORCID iD: 0009-0006-5328-335X

On 11 March 2026, the Supreme Court of India authorized the withdrawal of life-sustaining treatment from Harish Rana to allow a compassionate death (Harish Rana versus Union of India and others; Miscellaneous application no 2238 of 2025).

The 32-year-old suffered a severe head injury in August 2013 when he was an engineering student at Punjab University, leaving him in a persistent vegetative state. The family made two pleas to the Delhi High Court and the Supreme Court of India, respectively, for the withdrawal of treatment, highlighting Harish’s non-existent quality of life. Both pleas were initially rejected on the grounds that Harish subsisted without external life support.

In 2025, after further deterioration of his condition, they re-appealed on the grounds that Harish now required life-support machines. Based on expert testimony from two medical boards confirming an inappreciable chance of recovery, the Supreme Court permitted the withdrawal of treatment.

While the act of bringing about consented death through the withdrawal or withholding of life-sustaining therapies has been legalized since the Supreme Court’s Common Cause case verdicts of 2018, it has only now been effectively exercised. The landmark ruling spotlights the capacity for withdrawal of futile treatments and highlights the importance of documents such as living wills, which champion patient autonomy. Euthanasia— the process of helping someone end their life—however, is still illegal in India and is a punishable criminal offence akin to murder.

Meanwhile, in the UK, the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill is currently making its way through the House of Lords in London; the bill aims to legalize assisted dying in terminally ill, competent adults with 6 months or less to live.

SAHIL SHAH, Wales, United Kingdom

ORCID iD: 0009-0006-5328-335X