Biodefense Doctoral Student Selected for Prestigious Biosecurity Fellowship

January 16, 2026

This story originally appeared in the Pandora Report.

Welcome to this week’s Pandora Report! Happy New Year!   This issue highlights breakthroughs in global health, including HIV and malaria milestones, ongoing challenges from U.S. foreign aid cuts, and cutting-edge developments in AI, biotechnology, and pandemic preparedness.  

Kimberly Ma, a Biodefense PhD student at the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University, has been selected for the 2026 class of the Emerging Leaders in Biosecurity Initiative (ELBI) fellowship. The ELBI Fellowship, offered by the Center for Health Security at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, is the most distinguished fellowship available to rising members of the biosecurity profession.  

Kimmy is a Policy Advisor at the U.S. National Security Commission on Emerging Biotechnology (NSCEB), where she leads the biosecurity workstream and co-leads the infrastructure workstream. Her work consists primarily of supporting NSCEB Commissioners in developing policy recommendations, legislative proposals, and external engagements with stakeholders and experts. Kimmy, who is in her fourth year in the Biodefense PhD program, said, “My time in George Mason’s Biodefense program as a PhD student has been a huge force in sharpening my mind when it comes to biosecurity and biodefense matters. I have no doubt that it has played a major factor in my professional success and selection into the ELBI cohort for this coming year. I look forward to building on my time at GMU this coming year through both my continued BIOD studies and ELBI engagements!”  

During the ELBI fellowship, participants will participate in biosecurity workshops, networking events, and research symposiums, both in Washington DC and abroad. Kimmy is the ninth Biodefense student or alum to be selected as an ELBI Fellow.

Global Health at a Crossroads: Turbulence and Transformation in 2025  

By Carmen Shaw, Co-Managing Editor of the Pandora Report  

Happy New Year! As we step into 2026, it’s worth taking a moment to reflect on 2025 – a year marked by deep challenges but also meaningful progress in global health.  

Several major changes left the global health system on shaky grounds. Severe U.S. foreign aid cuts, the dissolution of USAID, and shifting priorities among major donors – including France, Germany, and the United Kingdom – left considerable gaps in disease-focused programs worldwide.  

And yet, 2025 also delivered historic milestones as well. The Maldives eliminated mother-to-child transmission of HIV, syphilis, and hepatitis B, while Brazil was validated by WHO for reducing vertical HIV transmission, becoming the largest country in the Americas to reach this achievement. Suriname, Timor-Leste, and Georgia were all certified as malaria-free, joining a growing cohort of now 47 countries and one territory. Meanwhile, new HIV-prevention drugs are emerging: the drug known as Lenacapavir was approved in the U.S. after clinical trials showed it to be nearly 100% effective in HIV prevention in women and 96% effective in men. In November, the U.S. Department of State and the Global Fund delivered the first of 4 million doses to low- and middle-income countries, with Eswatini and Zambia receiving initial allocations.  

At the same time, the U.S. global health engagements continue to shift. Under its new, “America First” strategy, the Trump administration has signed bilateral health agreements with at least nine African nations – including Kenya, Nigeria, and Rwanda – emphasizing “mutual benefit,” conditionality, and reduced financial assistance. The approach has raised concerns, as some of those that have signed deals either have been affected by U.S. aid cuts or have agreements to accept and host third-country deportees.  

These policy changes abroad come as scientific and public health sectors experience added pressures at home. A new report from Yale’s Center for Infectious Disease Modeling and Analysis (CIDMA) warns that cancelling federal funding for mRNA vaccine research could carry devastating consequences, estimating more than $75 billion in annual economic losses and over 49,000 preventable deaths each year. “mRNA vaccine platforms represent an extraordinary convergence of clinical promise and societal value,” said Alison Galvani, director of CIDMA.  

Food safety experts are also sounding the alarm: recent federal cuts could degrade U.S. food safety leaving more people vulnerable to foodborne illness. These changes include a reduced number of pathogens now monitored by surveillance programs, brain drain of CDC and FDA staff, and cuts to administrative and inspection capacity. This has led to a historic low in inspections of foreign food facilities and U.S. imports, raising the likelihood of the occurrence of preventable outbreaks.   

As infectious-disease experts look toward 2026, many are watching the potential threats posed by avian influenza (H5N1), mpox, HIV, and measles as viruses that could affect human lives in new ways. While the public health landscape continues to evolve, it remains essential that we work together coherently toward a well-functioning system and society that protects everyone – advancing scientific breakthroughs as we navigate unprecedented political headwinds.  

Further Reading: 

Avian Influenza Updates: Catching Up After the Holiday Break 

By Margeaux Malone, Pandora Report Associate Editor 

Highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) showed no signs of slowing during the holiday season. In late December, confirmed outbreaks of bird flu struck five additional US states, affecting more than 128,000 birds. The largest single loss occurred at a broiler farm in Maryland, where over 96,000 birds were affected. Additional outbreaks hit Arkansas, Kansas, Nebraska, and New York. In December 2025, 80 U.S. flocks confirmed detections of bird flu, with more than one million birds affected across 26 commercial and 54 backyard flocks. 

New Spillover Event in Wisconsin Dairy Cattle 

On December 14, USDA confirmed detection of HPAI in a Wisconsin dairy herd, representing a new spillover event from wildlife into cattle. Whole-genome sequencing revealed that the virus is H5N1 clade 2.3.4.4b genotype D1.1, a strain implicated in spillover events in two dairy herds in Nevada and Arizona in early 2025. The recently detected Wisconsin case is considered separate from those previous spillovers and, thus far, no additional infected herds have been identified in connection with this event. Of note, the D1.1 genotype is distinct from the B3.13 genotype that has affected most US dairy herds since bird flu infection in cattle was first detected in the Texas Panhandle in late 2023. 

Global Wildlife Crisis 

Unfortunately, the avian influenza outbreak extends far beyond farms and commercial animals. The European Food Safety Authority reported exceptionally high HPAI activity in wild birds during Europe’s 2025 autumn migration. Detections quadrupled from 2024, reaching the highest levels since 2016. The resulting wildlife mortality in many bird species and as a result of spillover events in mammals have caused unprecedented biodiversity loss globally. For instance, in the subantarctic islands of South Georgia, southern elephant seals have lost nearly 50% of breeding females since 2023, and albatross colonies in the Falkland Islands experienced recurrent outbreaks and marked declines in breeding birds. The World Organization for Animal Health has stressed that continued spillover of bird flu into mammals also raises One Health concerns with potential consequences for companion animals, agricultural species, and human health as the outbreaks continue.  

Growing Concerns for Human Health in 2026 

Virologists have expressed heightened concerns about avian influenza’s trajectory in the coming year. While human cases remain rare in the United States, with only 71 confirmed human cases resulting in two deaths, experts warn that the virus’s widespread circulation in migratory birds, farm animals, and many mammalian species increases the risk of dangerous mutations from genome reassortment. Every new infected host represents another opportunity for the virus to evolve as their segmented genome allows different strains to mix and produce new hybrid viruses when they infect the same cell. The central fear continues to be the risk of sustained human-to-human transmission, which fortunately hasn’t yet occurred; however, experts are concerned about surveillance gaps in the US. Monitoring varies dramatically between states and data sharing has become inconsistent and harder to interpret, raising the risk that early warning signs could be missed.  

Meanwhile, seasonal human influenza cases have skyrocketed, with more than 25% of tests positive for influenza as of late December, almost double last year’s rate at this time. Hospitalization rates are three times higher than the 2023-2024 season and have already surpassed last season’s peak, which wasn’t reached until February. The surge is driven by subclade K, a variant that emerged after this year’s flu vaccine was designed, making the shot less effective than usual and providing only 30-40% protection against hospitalization in adults. The combination of widespread avian influenza circulation in animals and a severe season of established human flu strains with reduced vaccine effectiveness raises troubling questions: if our healthcare systems are already strained by a poorly matched seasonal flu vaccine, what would happen if H5N1 suddenly gained the ability to spread between humans? 

Fortunately, progress is still being made toward a bird flu vaccine in humans. Moderna announced in mid-December that it received over $54 million in funding from the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), a public-private partnership working to develop vaccines for pandemic preparedness, to take its H5 avian influenza mRNA vaccine candidate into Phase 3 clinical trials. The Biden administration had previously awarded the pharmaceutical and biotechnology company over $700 million in government contracts for avian influenza vaccine research; however, these contracts were canceled by the Department of Health and Human Services earlier this year under Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the new administration who have been critical of mRNA vaccine technology. In exchange for the funding from CEPI, Moderna has agreed to allocate 20% of vaccine production for low- and middle-income countries at affordable prices if the vaccine is approved and an avian influenza pandemic materializes.  

Further Reading: 

In Other News 

Chemical and Biological Weapons History 

AI, Biotechnology & Future Biosecurity Risks  

WMD, Fentanyl, and Public Health Misinformation 

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