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(CIDRAP News) In an unprecedented move, the US government, following an advisory panel's advice, has asked the journals Science and Nature to omit key details of two studies on the transmissibility of dangerous mutant strains of H5N1 influenza viruses in ferrets on grounds that the information could be misused by bioterrorists.
(CIDRAP News) Public health programs that detect and respond to bioterror events and disease outbreaks are at risk from federal and state budget cuts, a threat that could worsen over the next year if automatic across-the-board cuts kick in, according to an annual preparedness report card released today.
Dec 20, 2011
(CIDRAP News) An analysis of 2009 H1N1 influenza virus isolates from the 2010-11 flu season suggests that low-level community transmission of an oseltamivir-resistant strain took place, a development that bears close watching, researchers reported today.
(CIDRAP News) Flu activity remained low in the Northern Hemisphere last week, with only a few countries, such as Costa Rica and Cameroon, reporting spikes in the number of cases, the World Health Organization (WHO) said today.
Costa Rica is the only tropical country in the Americas to report increasing numbers of cases, which are primarily influenza A/H3N2, the WHO said.
Dec 16, 2011
(CIDRAP News) A federal auditor has found that the US Food and Drug Administration's (FDA's) management of food inspections by state officials on the FDA's behalf has a number of weaknesses, including a failure in several states to ensure that inspections are completed and problems corrected.
Dec 15, 2011
(CIDRAP News) The US Government Accountability Office (GAO) today said drug shortages tripled over the past decade while in related news the Obama administration announced steps to address the problem.
Marcia Crosse, PhD, the GAO's director of healthcare, presented a GAO report today during testimony on prescription drug shortages before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP).
(CIDRAP News) The use of statinswidely used lipid-control drugswas associated with a 41% lower death rate in patients who were hospitalized with influenza, according to a surveillance study from the 2007-08 flu season that spanned 10 states.
Dec 13, 2011
(CIDRAP News) – Novartis's new cell-culture based influenza vaccine factory in North Carolina has begun making a prepandemic H5N1 flu vaccine and is ready to start producing vaccines for a real pandemic when needed, the company and federal health officials announced yesterday.
The facility in Holly Springs, N.C., billed as the first of its kind in the United States, was dedicated yesterday after a long testing process.
(CIDRAP News) Though botulism outbreaks in Europe are often traced to home-canned food, three recent outbreaks were linked to commercially distributed food, raising important food safety issues, investigators reported last week.
Dec 12, 2011
(CIDRAP News) The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) today confirmed two more infections with novel flu viruses, in children in Minnesota and West Virginia, only one of which involves the novel H3N2 strain found this year in four other states.
(CIDRAP News) The interplay between influenza and pneumococcal disease has been difficult to sort out, but the 2009 H1N1 pandemic offered researchers a unique chance to explore the impact of flu on pneumonia hospitalizations, which they found was significant.
