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(CIDRAP News) – A Saskatchewan man who died earlier this summer was Canada's first victim of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD), but he probably acquired the disease in the United Kingdom, Canadian health officials announced yesterday.

(CIDRAP News) – An outbreak of Salmonella infections linked to tomatoes affected at least 141 people, including 48 organ transplant recipients, who attended the US Transplant Games in Florida in late June, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported yesterday.

(CIDRAP News) – The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is warning of a possible risk of tularemia transmission from pet prairie dogs because of an outbreak at a Texas company that distributes the animals nationwide and internationally.

(CIDRAP News) – Restaurant food that was contaminated, probably deliberately, with a pesticide made 107 people sick and puzzled epidemiologic investigators for 4 months in 1998 and 1999, according to a report in today's issue of the Journal of the American Medical Assocation.

(CIDRAP News) – The Escherichia coli O157:H7 outbreak linked with ground beef from ConAgra Beef in Greeley, Colo., has grown to 34 cases and claimed the life of an elderly woman, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

(CIDRAP News) – At least 32 people suffered Escherichia coli O157:H7 infections in a July outbreak that was linked to romaine lettuce distributed in the Spokane, Wash., area, according to local and federal health officials.

(CIDRAP News) – Foodborne disease outbreaks that occurred in schools between 1973 and 1997 made nearly 50,000 students sick and sent 1,514 to hospitals, according to a report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

(CIDRAP News) – Garry L. McKee, PhD, MPH, director of the Wyoming Department of Health, has been named administrator of the US Department of Agriculture (USDA's) Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS).

(CIDRAP News) – The outbreak of Escherichia coli O157:H7 infections linked with ground beef from a ConAgra packing plant in Greeley, Colo., has reached 28 cases in seven states, federal health officials said today in discussing their investigation of the outbreak.

(CIDRAP News) – Federal officials say that devices for quickly detecting Bacillus anthracis spores in the environment are not reliable and should not be used in assessing possible bioterrorism threats.

(CIDRAP News) – Three more cases of Escherichia coli O157:H7 infection have been linked with ground beef recalled by a ConAgra plant in Greeley, Colo., bringing the total to 19, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said yesterday.

(CIDRAP News) – The House of Representatives' version of a bill to set up a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) would keep the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in control of public health programs for dealing with bioterrorism, according to an official of the American Society for Microbiology (ASM).

(CIDRAP News) – ConAgra Foods is voluntarily recalling 18 million pounds of ground beef from a plant in Greeley, Colo., as a result of 16 cases of Escherichia coli O157:H7 infection linked with meat from the plant, US Department of Agriculture (USDA) officials announced today.

The action, one of the largest ground beef recalls on record, is an expansion of a 354,000-pound voluntary recall that USDA announced Jun 30.

(CIDRAP News) – President Bush's National Strategy for Homeland Security, released this week, lays out a lengthy agenda for defending the country against bioterrorism as well as other kinds of terrorist attacks.

Note: This article was updated on Jul 16, 2002, with comments from a senior health economist at CDC on the study discussed.

(CIDRAP News) – Though two top federal health officials recently were quoted as saying that half a million healthcare workers may be vaccinated against smallpox, the official word from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is that the scope of the vaccination program has not yet been decided.

July 9, 2002 (CIDRAP News) - Several national public health organizations are urging Congress and the Bush administration not to shift federal bioterrorism preparedness programs from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to the proposed Department of Homeland Security.

(CIDRAP News) – Confirming earlier unofficial reports, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Tommy Thompson today named infectious disease expert Julie Gerberding, MD, MPH, as the new permanent director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). She becomes the first woman to lead the agency.

July 2, 2002 (CIDRAP News) – A recent series of 47 cases of salmonellosis in five states has linked an increasingly common multidrug-resistant strain of Salmonella enterica serotype Newport with ground beef, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

July 1, 2002 (CIDRAP News) – About half of the nation's supply of anthrax vaccine—previously dedicated almost entirely to military use—will henceforward be set aside for civilian use in the event of another anthrax attack, federal defense and health officials announced Jun 28.