"It affects every organ of the body,” said Rubhana Raqib, a senior scientist at the International Centre for Diarrheal Disease Research in Bangladesh (ICDDR,B). Some experts have suggested the scale of the poisoning in Bangladesh is far beyond that of other better-known human-caused catastrophes, such as the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.

Over the past few months, the surge in cases has pushed Bangladesh’s health system to the limit, with hospital corridors overflowing with patients as wards run out of beds.

The disease, which is caused by a parasite spread by the bite of sandlies, had swelled his organs, recalls Dr. Dinesh Mondal, of the Dhaka-based research institute icddr,b. "His spleen was so big. His liver was not functioning. He was just left to die."

This year, six countries have managed to eliminate the threat of at least one of the diseases on the WHO's list of "neglected tropical diseases." Dr. Dinesh Mondal is a Bangladeshi research scientist. He recalls the scenes in the mid-2000s, when he first started working with the government to combat this disease.

People in South Asia have the highest levels of lead in their blood, according to a new study published in the Lancet Planetary Health. Pinpointing the main cause had long seemed daunting, because lead is everywhere in the region. Traces of the metal can be found in cooking utensils, cosmetics and other everyday products. But in 2019 a team of researchers from Stanford University and the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr, b ), a health-research institute, began focusing on turmeric adulteration.

Single-dose vaccine demonstrates safety, immune responsiveness in children, adults, effective against all 4 dengue serotypes, shows study

A dengue vaccine has been successfully tested for the first time in Bangladesh, raising hopes for the south Asian country to overcome the epidemic, scientists revealed in a new study, according to a statement on Thursday.

The Nipah virus (NiV), an emerging zoonotic pathogen transmitted by bats, has been a cause for great concern ever since the mysterious and deadly illness first emerged in Malaysia in the late 1990s. But nowhere has its presence been more acutely felt than in Bangladesh. Since 2001, NiV has been endemic in the country, and with no vaccines available to defend against it, a staggering 71% of the identified cases have resulted in death. These aren’t just numbers; they represent people, families, and communities that have been deeply affected.

The soft footfalls of thousands of moccasins along unpaved rural roads across Bangladesh could be considered the soundtrack to this country's astonishing success in its battle against malaria.

"Nipah is terrifying, unusually terrifying," says Dr. Stephen Luby, currently a professor of medicine at Stanford University, who was in charge of the outbreak investigation for eight years at the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b).

Dr Mohammad Shafiul Alam, a scientist in the infectious diseases unit at a health research centre in Dhaka called icddr,b, added that “everyone knows someone who has caught dengue”. Official figures, he said, do not give a true indication of the size of the outbreak, as they only include people who have gone to hospital.

In 1978, The Lancet didn't hold back, declaring ORS as 'potentially the most important medical advance of this century.' Yet, with a tinge of bitter irony, I pen down these words knowing that half a million children under the age of five still lose their lives to diarrhoeal diseases annually. Even more disheartening is the fact that a about half of children suffering from diarrhoea aren't receiving the potentially life-saving ORS. These aren't cold, hard statistics; they're heart-wrenching realities. They're the lives of children we have the power to save.

HKG Epitherapeutics Ltd., the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University, and a team of eminent Bangladeshi clinicians and scientists have announced the development of a transformative high-throughput assay for early detection of Hepatocellular Carcinoma (HCC).

"Our research shows that when air pollution increases, more children are born with low weight or prematurely," says Mahin Al Nahian, who researches climate change and health.

Published 27 March in The Journal of Infectious Diseases, the study notes that many children, particularly in low- and middle-income countries, suffer from multiple bouts of diarrhoea during the first year of life, despite improvements in toilet facilities, clean water access, immunisation services and exclusive breastfeeding.

A new study published in The Journal of Climate Change and Health found that mothers exposed to high levels of air pollution during pregnancy had a higher rate of low birth weight in 3,206 babies born in Dhaka between 2014 and 2017.

Post-coronavirus has more physical effects on women than men, particularly creating respiratory and cardiovascular complications in the following weeks, according to a recent study conducted by a Bangladeshi research organization. The study, titled "Features and risk factors of post-COVID-19 syndrome: Findings from a longitudinal study in Bangladesh," is the first of its kind in Asia, and found that COVID-19 long-term effects differ between men and women.

Three years ago, on March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic. The virus had spread across the globe, and the WHO announcement triggered unprecedented measures – governments ordered people to quarantine, borders closed and mandatory masking became commonplace.

When Dr. Firdausi Qadri thinks about the number of cases of cholera in the world today—that ancient disease that still kills tens of thousands each year—she's frustrated. "It's a disgrace that we see so much cholera today, including in countries that haven't had the disease for many years," she says. Qadri has studied and fought the scourge for much of her decades-long career with the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b for short).

More than three years since the start of the COVID pandemic, infectious disease experts are studying other viruses with pandemic potential. Their goal is to understand how pandemics begin and how they can be prevented. This is the focus of the NPR series "Hidden Viruses: How Pandemics Really Begin." In this episode, NPR's Ari Daniel takes us to Bangladesh, where researchers studied a dangerous virus called "Nipah" and how it spreads.