News & Perspective

(CIDRAP News) – The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has revised its list of potentially dangerous biological agents and toxins and the regulations covering them, and some of the changes have public health laboratories concerned.

(CIDRAP News) – A federal advisory committee is recommending that 11 bacterial species and viruses on the current "select agent" list, including anthrax and Ebola virus, be singled out for special safeguards and that another 19 agents be dropped from the list entirely.

(CIDRAP News) – Researchers have found evidence of Ebola virus infection in three African species of bats that are eaten by humans, suggesting that bats may be a natural reservoir of the mysterious virus, according to a report published today in Nature.

(CIDRAP News) – Federal health officials yesterday released a 37-page report that they say demonstrates "tremendous progress" in developing countermeasures for bioterrorism through federally funded research since early 2002.

(CIDRAP News) – The head of the World Health Organization's (WHO's) communicable disease programs says severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) may pose a more serious global health threat than any other new disease in the past 20-plus years, with the sole exception of AIDS.