Leaders of the CDC, HHS and FDA held a press conference Aug. 23 about the upcoming respiratory virus season. Here are four things to know:

Despite the nation's birth rate falling, new data from the CDC suggests a growing number of women go without any prenatal care while pregnant. 

A new World Health Organization report has found that 2.6 million deaths were attributable to alcohol consumption in 2019.

The CDC has issued a health advisory to clinicians and public health authorities due to the increase of Oropouche virus cases in the Americas.

COVID-19 emergency department visits were down 1.5% for Aug. 10-16, compared to the week prior, but remain elevated compared to previous months, the CDC found.

A Boston hospital and health officials are warning that a new trending TikTok treat-making video is causing severe burns in patients, The Washington Post reported Aug. 15.

The antiviral drug tecovirimat did not reduce the duration of mpox lesions in a randomized, placebo-controlled trial.

Lawmakers in Nassau County, N.Y., have enacted a law that prohibits the use of masks or facial coverings in public. While the law includes exemptions for medical reasons, critics of the ban argue it could still create health risks, USA Today reported Aug. 14.

The New York State Department of Health issued an advisory Aug. 14 asking providers to discontinue use of ciprofloxacin as a post-exposure prophylaxis for close contacts of patients with meningococcal disease.

World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, PhD, has declared the mpox outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and other African countries a public health emergency of international concern.

Human parvovirus B19 activity is on the rise in the U.S., particularly among children, the CDC said in an Aug. 13 health alert. 

The CDC slightly raised its risk assessment of the H5N1 bird flu virus in an Aug. 9 update, noting it poses a future "potential public health risk."

The CDC now considers COVID-19 to be endemic, though not all health experts agree with this classification, NPR reported Aug. 9.

A more severe strain of mpox is circulating in Central Africa, the CDC said in an Aug. 7 outbreak alert. 

A SARS-CoV-2 protein and multi-inflammatory syndrome in children might be connected, said researchers at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. 

Emergency department visits involving a COVID-19 diagnosis have been on the rise for several consecutive weeks. For the week ending July 27, 2.2% of ED visits at U.S. hospitals were positive for the virus, marking a 12.1% jump from the week prior. 

Emergency department visits related to vaping have more than doubled across Virginia since 2020, WTOP News reported Aug.1.

Public trust in physicians and hospitals has sharply declined from 71.5% in April 2020 to just 40.1% in January 2024, according to results of a study published July 31 in JAMA Network Open.

A seventh person has been deemed HIV-free following a stem cell transplant, but he's only the second to be treated with stem cells not resistant to the virus, according a July 26th report from Nature.

Leaders at Butler (Pa.) Memorial Hospital had a very "compacted timeframe" to prepare for its role in treating former President Donald Trump after an assassination attempt July 13, Thomas Chakurda, chief marketing officer of Independence Health, the system that owns the hospital, told Becker's.