Saturday, 6 June 2026 edition — The Vital Record

In brief

• Public Health US measles cases hit 2,030 in 2026, nearing all of last year's total The CDC counts 2,030 confirmed cases across 40 jurisdictions through June 4, 93% tied to outbreaks, with the year not yet half over.
• Devices & Diagnostics FDA labels BD Pyxis cabinet recall Class II after fingerprint scanner found to overheat enough to burn users Nearly 16,000 automated medication cabinets fall under the FDA's second-most-serious recall tier (Class II) after CareFusion 303 warned that the Bio-ID scanner can reach a temperature capable of causing a first-degree burn.
• Research In a trial, finerenone slowed kidney decline in CKD without diabetes — an investigational use a 14,574-patient pool aims to widen In the phase 3 FIND-CKD trial, finerenone — approved only for CKD with type 2 diabetes and for HFmrEF/HFpEF — met its eGFR-slope endpoint in non-diabetic kidney disease, and the INFINITY pooled analysis extends the case across CKD causes; the non-diabetic use is investigational and awaits regulatory review.
• Research Oral GLP-1 pill aleniglipron reaches up to 11.3% placebo-adjusted weight loss in a phase 2b trial In the 230-person ACCESS dose-finding study, the investigational once-daily pill — not approved or available for prescription — met its primary endpoint at all three doses, with weight loss not yet plateaued at 36 weeks; the trial excluded people with diabetes and enrolled overweight participants only with a weight-related comorbidity.
• Clinical Trials Novartis halts EPIK-O after alpelisib-olaparib fails to beat chemotherapy in platinum-resistant ovarian cancer In the Phase 3 trial the combination did not improve progression-free survival over single-agent chemotherapy and carried more serious toxicity; Novartis stopped the study by sponsor decision.
• FDA & Regulatory FDA grants salanersen Breakthrough Therapy status, an early step for Biogen's investigational once-yearly SMA drug The designation is a procedural status, not an approval; salanersen's once-yearly dosing is a development goal and its early efficacy comes only from a small, uncontrolled, company-reported pediatric cohort.
• Devices & Diagnostics B. Braun recalls 686,750 spinal anesthesia trays after Huons recalls the bupivacaine inside them Two Class 2 sub-recalls cover every US-distributed prefilled spinal kit holding the South Korean maker's voluntarily recalled drug.
• Research A trial moved seven paralyzed stroke arms again — with the spinal cord wired A feasibility trial used temporary cervical implants to assist arm and hand movement in seven people with chronic post-stroke hemiparesis, with no serious adverse events — a follow-on to the same group's two-patient first-in-human study.
• Clinical Trials J&J's 14,194-Patient Milvexian Trial in Heart Attack Survivors Is Marked Completed LIBREXIA-ACS, the largest trial yet of an oral Factor XIa inhibitor after acute coronary syndrome, now reads "Completed" on ClinicalTrials.gov. No results are posted.
• Digital Health & AI A leaderboard-listed LLM still botches potassium dosing in a preprint stress-test — while claiming full confidence A medRxiv preprint stress-tested GPT-5-Chat on 20 clinician-built potassium cases; accuracy peaked at 65% with the guideline in hand, yet the model claimed high confidence on 100% of answers.