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U.S. Launches Deadly Strikes On ISIS Terrorists In Nigeria; Zelenskyy Says He Plans To Meet Trump For Peace Talks On Sunday; Food Banks Struggling To Help Over The Holidays; UPS Plane Crash Death Toll Rises To 15; FDA Announces Recall Of Potentially Radioactive Frozen Shrimp. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired December 26, 2025 - 13:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[13:30:45]

ERICA HILL, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": We are following the developments out of Nigeria where the U.S. carried out strikes overnight on ISIS targets. A U.S. official telling CNN the strikes included Tomahawk missiles fired from a Navy vessel that struck two ISIS camps. Nigeria's foreign minister says he spoke to Secretary of State, Marco Rubio before the strikes and that his country's president gave the go-ahead.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

YUSUF TUGGAR, NIGERIAN FOREIGN MINISTER: What took place yesterday, clearly, underscores the fact that Nigeria is not lacking in will and a commitment to the fight against terrorism.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HILL: U.S. Military officials report multiple terrorists were killed in the attack on the ISIS camps. In a social media post, Defense Secretary, Pete Hegseth also said there's "more to come." CNN Military Analyst Colonel Cedric Leighton joins me now. Colonel, always good to see you. When we look at what we do know about this strike, Tomahawk missiles fired from a Navy vessel, what does it tell you about what this could mean moving forward?

COL. CEDRIC LEIGHTON (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Yeah, Erica, great to be with you. One of the things that it does tell us is that the administration is definitely willing to use military forces, especially in the form of Tomahawk missiles, to attack targets like those ISIS targets in the northwestern part of Nigeria. And now, the USS Paul Ignatius is the ship that probably was the one that was launching these missiles and they attacked an area that was frequented by ISIS terrorists, but the one problem with this is that these areas are very diverse in many respects and one of the key aspects, Erica, is that most of the attacks actually occur in the northeast of the country in a place called Borno State instead of in Sokoto, which is in the northwestern part. That was the area that they hit this time around.

HILL: Which has raised some questions. The other thing that really stands out to me, so it's important to note that there was this -- that they were acting in concert, right? That as we just heard from the foreign minister that Nigeria's officials were on board here. He also said a little bit more about the reasoning behind these strikes. I just want to play some of that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TUGGAR: It was a collaborative effort between Nigeria and the U.S. and President Tinubu gave the go-ahead before it took place, and we don't see it violating our sovereignty or territorial integrity, which is very important and it is not about religion. It's about the protection of lives and property of Nigerians and our neighbors as well.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HILL: So we hear the foreign minister there saying it is not about religion. President Trump is very clearly saying this is about religion, although it's important to note, as CNN has reported, the data does not necessarily reflect what President Trump has said is a disproportionate focus and attacks on Christians in Nigeria. How could these differing visions quite frankly of the reasoning here impact potential further cooperation between the U.S. and Nigeria?

LEIGHTON: Yeah, that's a really great question, Erica. One of the key aspects is that the Nigerians actually do see this as a public safety issue and they have mounted a bunch of anti-terrorist efforts against groups, not only the ISIS, but also Boko Haram, which is most active in the northeastern part. So, what this could do is, what this could portend for us and the Nigerians is that there could be a divergence in views and a divergence in operational actions. If that's the case, it could really spell a lot of trouble for future counterterrorism operations in the region.

So, the key will be for the people that are on the ground that are conducting liaison work with the Nigerians, they're going to have to, in essence, be very careful with how they couch this to the Nigerians and they're also, of course, going to have to make sure that from the U.S. point of view, hat that aspect is taken care of as well. But the fact is more on the side of the Nigerians. Basically, there have been more Muslims that have been killed in these types of attacks than Christians, although the numbers are very high for both sides and that's really the way this is going to play out.

[13:35:00]

It's going to have to be an anti-terrorism mission that really encompasses everything and not just one side or one religious aspect of this.

HILL: Or the other. Real quickly before I let you go, we've learned that President Zelenskyy is set to meet with President Trump on Sunday in Florida. President Zelenskyy has signaled his willingness to make a number of concessions here, perhaps most notably this free economic zone, essentially a demilitarized zone in the eastern part of the country. Do you have a sense of really how that would work? And whether Russia would agree long-term? LEIGHTON: Yeah, I think it's going to be very difficult for the Russians to agree to this given President Putin's position to, you know, on this subject now. If the Russians were willing to withdraw, they could have in fact a demilitarized zone in that area in Eastern Ukraine, basically in the Donetsk Oblast, which is the area that they're fighting a lot over right now. The Ukrainians do have some things that they can tout as being really important military victories. For example, they took the town of Kupyansk. We took it from the Russians just recently.

They've also attacked some installations on the Black Sea coast oil installations. So, there are a lot of things that are in Ukraine's favor actually, at this particular point in time. Although the Russians are advancing in other parts, the Ukrainians are basically stalling them. So at some point, the Russians are going to have to give a little bit as well, in my opinion, but it may -- might not be a permanent solution to this issue at all.

HILL: Yeah. Col. Cedric Leighton, always appreciate your insight. Thank you.

LEIGHTON: You bet, Erica. Great to see it.

HILL: Well, the holidays can be challenging, as we know, for so many Americans, especially families struggling with food insecurity. Just ahead, we're going to speak with the president of a food bank that was helping people, is always helping people, but of course, on increase in need during the last government shutdown and they're now preparing for another one that could be just a few weeks away.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:41:03]

HILL: 2025 has been an especially difficult year for Americans who are facing food insecurity, Americans who are hungry, who just can't put enough food on the table. Typically, food banks have offered a consistent lifeline, but after a year of historic demand, a number of those organizations are also struggling to help those in need. Higher food prices along with delayed SNAP benefits, missed paychecks during the government shutdown, they're all forcing millions to rely on food banks in ways they likely haven't before and certainly more during the holiday season.

Joining us now is Trisha Cunningham. She's the President of the North Texas Food Bank. Trisha, it's really good to have you with us. It's so important that I think we remember this is not just an issue at the holidays. This is a year-round struggle for so many Americans. What did you notice this year in terms of demand?

TRISHA CUNNINGHAM, PRESIDENT, NORTH TEXAS FOOD BANK: Well, certainly, we saw everything go up. We had many people that were working families, that they had delayed paychecks or delayed benefits, and what we know is that those American citizens can't withstand more than a $400 impact to their income without going into crisis mode. This was from a Federal Reserve study that said 37 percent of Americans would have to sell something, put something on a credit card or take out a loan if they had more than a $400 impact to their monthly income.

So, these are the people that were dealing with the increase of rent and transportation and groceries that we were now seeing at the food bank line that had never been there before.

HILL: And are they staying longer? Are they meeting those -- are they needing the extra bit of help for a longer period of time than you've seen in the past?

CUNNINGHAM: What we know is that our neighbors are extremely resilient and they're going to do everything they can to try to make ends meet. But today, those paychecks just aren't going as far. And so yes, they're needing to have some additional benefits to be able to help, you know, sadly in the food banking area, the Feeding America food banks, we cover every zip code in the country and here in Texas, we have the most number of people that are food insecure out of the entire country. And we've seen that continue to increase over time and these individuals that also now are -- have the delayed SNAP benefits, which we're grateful that they're now going to be extended through September, but also we know that we are facing a potential furloughed worker situation again at the end of January if we don't have a resolution to the government shutdown.

HILL: Yeah.

CUNNINGHAM: So, these are making individuals fragile.

HILL: Also, your organization is also dealing, right, with a financial impact and higher costs of food as well, perhaps a drop in both in- kind donations and also financial donations. What does the picture look like?

CUNNINGHAM: We are watching it very closely. What we're seeing is that many of those organizations that used to donate food, they're being more effective and using A.I. tools and other things to manage their supply chain, so there's not as much excess food out there for food banks to get. But we are working very closely with those manufacturers to try to see what are the other ways that we can try to connect. And you're right, it is costing us more. Whenever you see consumer prices increase, those retail prices, there the wholesale prices also increase. We're buying more food now than we ever had to try to meet the gap because we've seen reductions in government programs as well as some of the additional food that's coming in the door.

HILL: The holidays can also be especially tough for families because kids aren't getting perhaps some of the supplemental nutrition and meals that they get at school. I know that sometimes on the weekends, a number of different food banks to do a backpack program, that they send things home over the weekend, but if we're talking about maybe two weeks of a holiday break, that's another challenge for so many families. How do you address that?

CUNNINGHAM: You're absolutely right, Erica. Families have to provide an extra 10 meals per week for every child that school age that they would normally get at -- take advantage of the free or reduced lunch during the school day. [13:45:00]

So that's a lot of extra burden on families. We see that also in the summertime. When you have those extended breaks, that's extra resources that has to be used to be able to feed those children in the family And we know about 30 percent of those that are food insecure in our area are children. So it's a really huge issue. We've always done school pantries and backpack programs to try to meet those needs, but it's especially difficult during the holiday time whenever those individuals and kids, they just want to have nutritious meals on their table.

HILL: Yeah, it's an important reminder that often, our neighbors are fighting battles we don't know about and even if folks maybe can't afford to give financially, I know their time is incredibly valuable as a volunteer as well. Trisha, thank you for joining us and thank you for everything that you and your colleagues are doing.

CUNNINGHAM: Thank you, Erica.

HILL: I want to get you caught up on some of the other headlines we're watching at this hour. The death toll in that UPS plane crash in Louisville, Kentucky last month has now risen to 15. Alain Rodriguez Colina who suffered severe injuries died on Christmas Day, which increased that death toll. The plane crashed just after takeoff in early November. Three pilots on board and 11 people on the ground were killed that day. A preliminary report from the NTSB said a failure in hardware that kept the left engine attached to the plane caused the crash.

If you buy frozen shrimp, it is time to check your freezer. The FDA announcing recall due to, get this, possible radioactive contamination. The recall involves some 83,000 bags which were imported from Indonesia. They're sold under the brands Market 32 and Waterfront Bistro. They're sold at supermarkets in some 17 states.

And while you may have watched Home Alone this holiday season, one twelve-year-old boy in Long Island actually lived his own version of the Christmas classic. Tristen Taylor was in fact home alone when he heard the kitchen window break, followed by the sound of footsteps, turns out a burglar was inside walking room to room. Tristen thinking quickly snuck out of the house through a back window, called 9-1-1. Police arrived within a few minutes and arrested the suspect. Good work, Tristen.

Still to come here, cases of the flu on the rise across the country and while Tamiflu is often the go-to treatment, it is not your only option. We'll take you through a few of the others, coming up on "CNN News Central."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:51:26]

HILL: The battle over public health reaching a fever pitch in 2025. CNN's Chief Medical Correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta has a look at the top health and medical stories of 2025.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: 2025 was a veritable battleground for public health as it faced challenge after challenge after challenge. Mass layoffs, an armed attack on the CDC, and as misinformation gained momentum, once forgotten viruses took hold on U.S. Soil. But as always, with science and medicine, progress does persist.

GUPTA (voice-over): It is impossible to ignore the impact of MAHA. It's been the rallying cry of HHS Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

ROBERT F. KENNEDY JR., HHS SECRETARY: The real overhaul is improving the health of the entire nation to Make America Healthy Again.

GUPTA: The main driver of the movement, reducing chronic disease, and a lot of efforts to that end like condemning ultra-processed foods and taking action on artificial food dyes. Those have been largely applauded by public health experts. But other targets of the MAHA movement, those have them worried.

SEN. BILL CASSIDY, (R-LA): We currently have our current vaccine schedule based upon a lot of people who know a heck of a lot, looking at things not to make mandates, but to make recommendations.

KENNEDY JR.: They mix (inaudible) fluoride in our water.

GUPTA: This year, we saw some states take steps to ban fluoride in their water supply. Dentists and other public health experts worry that its removal will increase cavities, especially for people without access to regular dental care. But, supporters of these bands point to studies that found children exposed to higher fluoride levels have lower IQs and more neurobehavioral issues. But, as with so many things this year, there is important nuance.

Those studies looked at levels much higher, almost double than the levels found in the majority of public water systems. In fact, another study found that fluoride at the recommended levels in drinking water did not negatively affect cognitive ability.

DR. MARTY MAKARY, FDA COMMISSIONER: There may be no other medication in the modern era that can improve the health outcomes of women on a population level than hormone replacement therapy.

GUPTA: In November, the FDA announced that it was taking steps to remove what is known as a black-box warning for many hormone treatments for women with menopause symptoms. Now, while this change is expected to give women more options for treatments, I do want to stress that it needs to still start with a conversation with your doctor.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR OF "ANDERSON COOPER 360": President Trump and Health Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. today publicly linking the rise in the number of cases of autism to the use of acetaminophen or Tylenol by women during pregnancy. KENNEDY JR.: Today, the FDA will issue a physician's notice about the risk of acetaminophen during pregnancy and begin the process to initiate a safety label change.

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Don't take Tylenol. Don't take it.

GUPTA: Now, the FDA was much more nuanced in its warning, saying that pregnant women should use the lowest effective dose for the shortest necessary duration and only when treatment is required. However, there is decades of evidence that Tylenol or acetaminophen is among the safest options for pregnant women dealing with fever or pain, and that it does not cause autism.

DR. EDITH BRACHO-SANCHEZ, PRIMARY CARE PEDIATRICIAN: I understand the risks of a fever and pregnancy, which is risk of miscarriage, risk of birth defects, and I said, no way am I taking that risk.

[13:55:00]

TIM ANDREWS, RECEIVED A KIDNEY TRANSPLANT FROM A PIG: It may shorten your life, but you're going to do something for humanity.

GUPTA: This year, we follow the courageous journey of Tim Andrews, the fourth living patient in the United States to get a genetically- modified pig kidney transplant. It's a process known as xenotransplantation.

ANDREWS: And the little pig is right there, so I can pat it.

GUPTA (voice-over): Tim lived with a pig kidney for a record 271 days and while they did have to have it removed, his case helps move this field farther into the future, especially as larger-scale human clinical trials are just on the horizon.

GUPTA: When do you think this might be available for the average person?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think less than five years.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT: We just learned that Robert Kennedy Jr., the Secretary of Health and Human Services, will announce huge layoffs today, some ten thousand jobs across the agency, and this comes on top of some ten thousand employees who left the department voluntarily.

GUPTA: Thousands of jobs, billions of dollars in research funding stripped, it's almost unimaginable to predict the long-term impacts of the Trump administration's cuts to public health.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is going to make it more challenging to bring the best new treatments for children with cancer.

GUPTA (voice-over): And the cuts extended beyond America's shores.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Withdrawing from the World Health Organization. GUPTA (voice-over): Global programs like Gavi and USAID, also had funding pulled by the administration.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Please just give us medication. We still want to survive.

MEG TIRRELL, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: In Milwaukee, one kid was found to have really elevated blood lead levels and that sparked this whole public health investigation.

GUPTA: And that Investigation led them to Milwaukee's public schools and several other children who had elevated blood lead levels. For the first time, they were able to link lead poisoning in children to the city's aging schools. The problem we found when traveling there is that most of the school buildings were built before 1978. That's before lead paint was banned. And to further complicate the city's efforts to handle this crisis, those cuts I was just talking about, that left the city without federal support.

DR. MICHAEL TOTORAITIS, MILWAUKEE COMMISSIONER OF HEALTH: Investigation into the potential chronic exposures of students at the districts is a part that we were really looking to the CDC to help us with. And unfortunately, HHS had laid off that entire team for childhood blood exposure. These are the best and brightest minds in these areas around lead poisoning and now they're gone.

SARA SIDNER, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The FDA just did something that could be a game-changer for people living with pain.

GUPTA: For the first time in more than 25 years, the agency approved a new class of pain medication. It's called Suzetrigine. It's not an opioid. It works by preventing pain signaling nerves around the body from firing in the first place, so that message of pain never makes it to the brain. And even cooler, this medication was actually discovered after researchers learned about a family of firewalkers in Pakistan that lacked a gene allowing those pain signals to be sent. Those people, they could walk on hot coals without flinching.

A new FDA-approved blood test could help diagnose Alzheimer's by detecting certain biomarkers of the disease. It will still need to be used alongside other diagnostic tools like neurological exams and brain imaging, but Preventive Neurologist, Dr. Richard Isaacson says that he thinks blood tests will be a great new option for screening.

DR. RICHARD ISAACSON, NEUROLOGIST: I believe this is a screening test that may predict if a person is going to be more likely to be on the road to Alzheimer's or dementia in 10 20, 30 or 40 years.

GUPTA (voice-over): And that means patients, including myself, who went through a battery of tests with Isaacson, can get a baseline for their risk and they can also track their progress while applying certain lifestyle interventions.

ISAACSON: Your numbers went from, huh (ph), to faster and better than your age, that you're actually six years younger in your age.

GUPTA: Six years younger?

Have you ever seen measles before?

DR. JENNIFER SHUFORD, COMMISSIONER, TEXAS DEPARTMENT OF STATE HEALTH SERVICES: No, and I'm an infectious disease physician.

GUPTA: Wow.

SHUFORD: I've never diagnosed a case.

GUPTA: That's incredible.

SHUFORD: It's because, you know, measles was declared eliminated --

GUPTA: Right.

SHUFORD: -- from the United States back in the year 2000 because of the effectiveness of that vaccine.

GUPTA: A measles outbreak that started in Texas earlier this year. It signaled a worrying trend as cases continue to grow across the country, putting the U.S.' elimination status in jeopardy. But this is also symbolic of the larger fight over vaccines, especially as the RFK-appointed members of the highly influential Vaccine Advisory Committee to the CDC has pledged to re-examine the entire vaccine schedule, even for shots that have long-established safety records.

DR. PAUL OFFIT, DIRECTOR, VACCINE EDUCATION CENTER AT CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL OF PHILADELPHIA: The ACIP is full of people who are anti- vaccine activists and science denialists, so you know that the decisions that they're going to be making are not science-based.

GUPTA: As always, we'll continue our reporting and we'll bring you everything you need to know when it comes to your health in 2026. See you next year.