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(CIDRAP News) – Two new studies give reason to hope that vaccines prepared in advance could be of some help in combating an influenza pandemic.

(CIDRAP News) – A 28-year-old man has become Cambodia's second person to die of avian influenza, health authorities there announced today.

Three universities have begun recruiting volunteers for the first US clinical trial of a vaccine against H5N1 avian influenza, a key piece of the government's efforts to stave off a potential flu pandemic.

(CIDRAP News) – Laboratory tests have shown Marburg virus to be the cause of a hemorrhagic fever outbreak in northern Angola, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced yesterday.

(CIDRAP News) – An unidentified hemorrhagic fever appears to be targeting children younger than 5 in an outbreak in the African country of Angola.

At least 39 people are believed to have died of the suspected hemorrhagic fever syndrome in the northern province of Uige between January and mid-March, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced on Mar 17.

(CIDRAP News) – A Vietnamese newspaper has reported that 195 people in an area affected by H5N1 avian influenza have suspicious symptoms and are being tested for the disease.

(CIDRAP News) – A 5-year-old boy from central Vietnam has tested positive for H5N1 avian influenza, becoming the 25th Vietnamese to contract the disease since late December, according to a Vietnamese newspaper.

The boy, named Hoang Trong Duong, is from Quang Binh province and was hospitalized Mar 15 in Hue with high fever, cough, and lung infection, according to Than Nien News, a Ho Chi Minh City newspaper. He was in stable condition.

(CIDRAP News) – The causes of this week's anthrax alarms in the Washington, DC, area remained a mystery today as criticisms about communication and coordination by the Department of Defense (DoD) flew.

(CIDRAP News) – This week's health warnings about soft cheeses made from unpasteurized milk were based on 35 recent cases of tuberculosis in New York City that are believed to have been linked to raw-milk products.

(CIDRAP News) – The anthrax alert that shut down several government buildings in the Washington, DC, area this week and put hundreds of workers on preventive antibiotic treatment apparently was a false alarm.

Testing of more than 70 samples from a mail facility near the Pentagon in Arlington, Va., and a mailroom at an office complex in nearby Falls Church, Va., showed no trace of anthrax, the Washington Post reported today.

Editor's note: Based on a Food and Drug Administration news release, the original version of this story incorrectly listed Ranchero as one type of soft cheese that may be made from raw milk The FDA later issued a clarification saying that Ranchero is a trademark of the Cacique Co. of Industry, Calif., for a cheese made with pasteurized milk.

(CIDRAP News) – The World Health Organization (WHO) said today it has found 130 suspected cases of plague, 57 of them fatal, in its ongoing investigation of an outbreak in the northeastern Congo.

In its previous update on Mar 9, the agency had reported 114 cases, including 54 deaths.

(CIDRAP News) – Signs of anthrax detected by sensors at two military mail facilities in the Washington, DC, area yesterday prompted authorities to shut down several buildings and recommend antibiotics for hundreds of workers.

(CIDRAP News) – A second Vietnamese nurse who had cared for an avian influenza patient was reported to have a suspected case of the illness 2 days ago, but a Vietnamese newspaper said today that the nurse is free of the virus.

The nurse, a 41-year-old woman from Thai Binh province, was hospitalized in Hanoi Mar 10 with a high fever, cough, and a lung infection, according to a Mar 12 Associated Press (AP) report.

(CIDRAP News) – The recent series of cases of avian influenza in a single province in Vietnam has increased concern about whether the nature of the illness is changing.

(CIDRAP News) – Poor policy communication and a lack of clearly defined goals seriously hindered the smallpox preparedness program that the federal government launched in 2003, according to a report released by the prestigious Institute of Medicine (IOM) last week.

(CIDRAP News) – The strain of SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) that erupted from obscurity to kill 774 people worldwide has gone quiet, at least for now. Yet its lessons will keep benefiting people even if it never reappears.

(CIDRAP News) – Two relatives of avian influenza patients in northern Vietnam have tested positive for the virus without being sick, according to reports from Vietnam today.

The 61-year-old widow of a man who died of avian flu in late February and the 80-year-old grandfather of two patients currently under treatment in a hospital have tested positive, the Associated Press (AP) and other news services reported. Both are apparently healthy.

(CIDRAP News) – A 26-year-old Vietnamese nurse who helped care for a younger man with H5N1 avian influenza has contracted the illness, but it is unclear whether he acquired it from the patient or from poultry, according to news reports from Vietnam today.

(CIDRAP News) – A federal judge in Montana this week delayed a plan to reopen the US border to Canadian cattle for the first time since bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) was found in Canada.