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(CIDRAP News) – The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is proposing a new requirement for water systems that it says could prevent up to a million illnesses a year by reducing Cryptosporidium contamination in drinking water.

(CIDRAP News) – Because of a change in the case definition for SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome), the United States has had only half as many suspected and probable cases of the illness as previously reported, federal health officials said today.

(CIDRAP News) – Researchers at Vanderbilt University will study three different types of bandages for smallpox shot sites to compare their ability to prevent spread of the vaccinia virus and their effects on healing time, the university announced.

Jul 15 (CIDRAP NEWS) – The United Nations' food standards body announced last week that it would allow higher kiloGray (kGy) doses for irradiating food.

(CIDRAP NEWS) – The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has, as of Jul 11,  lifted its SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) travel alert for Beijing, China. Beijing was dropped from the list after 30 days—three times the incubation period—had elapsed since the onset of symptoms for the last reported case. Taiwan is now the only area on the CDC's SARS travel alert list. 

Editor's Note: A correction was made to paragraph 5 on July 14.

(CIDRAP News) – A feed plant in Tacoma, Wash., has admitted violating regulations intended to prevent the spread of mad cow disease and has promised to correct the problem, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced today.

(CIDRAP News) – The number of possible human monkeypox cases dropped in the past week as investigators ruled out 11 cases while confirming three, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced today.

(CIDRAP News) – The Bush administration has announced plans to expand and strengthen the Public Health Service (PHS) Commissioned Corps, the nation's uniformed force of health professionals who can be mobilized to respond to health emergencies around the country.

(CIDRAP News) – The five federal agencies most involved in biodefense face a talent shortage that could keep them from responding effectively to a major bioterrorist attack, according to a new report by a nonprofit group that works on civil service issues.

(CIDRAP News) – An influenza virus—especially one genetically manipulated for increased virulence—would be an attractive weapon for bioterrorists, according to physicians writing in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine.

(CIDRAP News) – SARS is no longer spreading in Taiwan and therefore appears to be contained worldwide, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced Jul 5.

The last probable SARS case in Taiwan and, for now, the world, was detected and isolated Jun 15, WHO officials said. After 20 days with no new cases in Taiwan, the WHO determined that the country was free of recent local transmission.

(CIDRAP News) – Canada's official report on its response to the mad cow disease case in Alberta suggests that the case might have resulted from the importation of American cattle or contaminated feed into Canada, among other possibilities.

(CIDRAP News) – The World Health Organization (WHO) today removed Toronto from the list of areas with recent local transmission of SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome), leaving Taiwan as the only place where the disease is not officially contained.

Toronto had a 4-month, two stage SARS outbreak that was the largest outside Asia, with almost 250 probable cases and at least 38 deaths. The city thought it had beaten the disease once before.

(CIDRAP News) – The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said today it has confirmed monkeypox in six rodents from a shipment of African mammals that is believed to be the source of the current monkeypox outbreak in the United States.

(CIDRAP News) – A team of experts who reviewed Canada's response to the recent mad cow disease case in Alberta recommended last week that Canada increase its efforts to ensure that high-risk parts of cattle do not end up in either human food or animal feed.

(CIDRAP News) – Despite progress in the past 2 years, local emergency response agencies in the United States remain dangerously unprepared for major terrorist attacks, according to a new study by the Council on Foreign Relations, a nonpartisan think tank.

(CIDRAP News) – Stampede Meat, Inc., Chicago, is recalling about 739,000 pounds of frozen beef products because of a possible link to five Escherichia coli O157:H7 infections in Minnesota, Kansas, and Michigan, the US Department of Agriculture announced yesterday.

(CIDRAP News) – The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is offering a new computer model to help hospitals and health systems estimate how many staff members they would need to dispense antibiotics or vaccinate people in response to bioterrorism or a major disease outbreak.

(CIDRAP News) – A Taiwanese man who was thought to have the first case of SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) in Japan does not have the disease after all, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced today.

Japanese health officials told the WHO that laboratory testing showed the man has influenza B, according to a WHO statement. The 33-year-old man arrived in Tokyo Jun 21 and experienced a high fever and other symptoms 2 days later.