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The Food and Drug Administration approved updated Covid vaccines on Thursday, clearing the way for manufacturers to ship doses to pharmacies and doctors’ offices. Moderna and Pfizer, which make the most commonly used Covid vaccines, are expected to begin shipping soon; Pfizer said it would do so “immediately,” and Moderna has done so within days of approval in past years. Sanofi, which distributes a non-mRNA option called Nuvaxovid (commonly known as Novavax), said doses would be available in the coming days, with the timing varying by location. ... The updated vaccines target the XFG variant of Covid, as an F.D.A. committee recommended this spring. That should be a good match for the virus that is circulating, said Dr. Ian Mellis, an assistant professor of pathology and cell biology at Columbia University. XFG is the most common variant in North America as of late August. (Astor, 8/27)

Parasitic illness cases linked to recalled iceberg lettuce have now been confirmed in 20 states, federal health officials said Thursday, expanding the scope of the largest outbreak of its kind in the U.S. The Food and Drug Administration said government scientists have now identified cases in three additional states: Georgia, Tennessee and Texas. (Perrone, 8/27)

As the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) end their investigation into the June Listeria outbreak tied to soft cheese, the FDA is reporting a new outbreak, this one involving Salmonella from an unidentified food source. The CDC has also released updated case counts for several smaller Cyclospora outbreaks. (Van Beusekom, 8/27)

A major produce lobby group asked US health officials to change how they communicate about a parasite outbreak that’s sickened thousands, citing battered consumer confidence and sagging sales of fruit and vegetables. The International Fresh Produce Association asked the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration to be more precise about which foods are unsafe to eat and urge Americans to keep eating fresh fruits and vegetables, the group said in an Aug. 10 letter viewed by Bloomberg News. (Nix, 8/27)

After nearly 30 days with no updates, the US Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) this week posted several recent H5N1 avian flu detections in both commercial poultry and dairy cattle. In the past 30 days there have been three confirmed detections in dairy cows, with Texas reporting two affected herds and Utah reporting a single detection. (Soucheray, 8/27)

�������ýҕ�l Health News: �������ýҕ�l Health News’ ‘What The Health?’: Summer’s Health Policy Themes

Summer may be approaching its end, but the health policy stories that have marked the season continue. In Washington and across the country, public health officials are still struggling with outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases such as measles, while states and health systems are preparing for the impact of major federal funding cuts to their Medicaid programs. (Rovner, 8/27)

The Ebola epidemic sweeping the Democratic Republic of Congo may be three times larger than official figures indicate, Africa’s top public-health agency said, suggesting thousands of infections are going undetected as authorities struggle to track transmission. Congo has officially recorded 5,713 confirmed infections and 2,744 deaths through Aug. 25. An outbreak three times that size would imply about 17,100 infections. The confirmed case-fatality ratio has climbed to 48% from 27% two months earlier. (Gale, Ambaye and Kew, 8/27)

The Ebola outbreak in Uganda is over now that 42 days have passed without a new confirmed case since the country’s last patient, who contracted the virus in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), was discharged from care on July 16. In total, the country had 20 confirmed cases and two deaths. The news comes as funding for a new candidate vaccine is announced. (Soucheray, 8/27)

Two employees at Frankfurt Airport died from a rare malaria outbreak this summer, most likely after a mosquito traveled to Germany on an airplane, the airport’s operator said this week. Six employees have contracted the disease since early July, Andreas Schopf, a spokesman for the airport’s operator, Fraport, said in an email on Thursday. Four have since recovered, he added. It was unclear when the two employees died. (Moses, 8/27)