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(CIDRAP News) – Now that most states have issued preliminary or final plans for dealing with pandemic influenza, a group of experts who looked at the public health strategies in the plans has given them a mixed review.

(CIDRAP News) – The US government announced yesterday the launch of a Web site that allows the public to view current information about testing of wild birds for H5N1 avian influenza.

(CIDRAP News) – Leading medical researchers yesterday announced the formation of a consortium to unlock genetic and other data on avian influenza in the hope of improving the understanding of how viruses such as H5N1 spread and evolve.

(CIDRAP News) – A procedural error at a feed mill might have resulted in contamination of cattle feed with banned materials and caused Canada's seventh case of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), or mad cow disease, the Canadian government said yesterday.

(CIDRAP News) – Avian flu experts in two of the countries with the most human H5N1 avian influenza cases to date—Vietnam and Thailand—are warning that the antiviral drug oseltamivir may mask the infection and complicate laboratory detection.

(CIDRAP News) – Canada has identified its eighth case of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), or mad cow disease, just a few weeks after the seventh case.

(CIDRAP News) – The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has published the genetic blueprints for more than 650 influenza virus genes to launch a new data-sharing program intended to stimulate influenza research.

(CIDRAP News) – Indonesia has confirmed its 60th human case of H5N1 avian influenza, this one in a 6-year-old girl who is recovering, the World Health Organization (WHO) said today.

The girl is from Bekasi, a city southeast of Jakarta in West Java, not part of the Cikelet subdistrict, where several recent cases and suspected cases sparked concern about possible human-to-human transmission.

(CIDRAP News) – US health officials broke new ground last week by approving the use of a mixture of bacteriophages, or bacteria-killing viruses, to control the pathogen Listeria monocytogenes on ready-to-eat (RTE) meat and poultry products.

(CIDRAP News) – A third human case of H5N1 avian influenza has been confirmed in a remote part of Indonesia where a number of suspected cases are being investigated, but most of the cases probably resulted from exposure to sick poultry, the World Health Organization (WHO) said today.

(CIDRAP News) – The World Health Organization (WHO) today changed the H5N1 avian influenza strains recommended for candidate vaccines for the first time since 2004, causing some experts to question how far the virus has evolved.

The WHO's new prototype strains, prepared by reverse genetics, include three new H5N1 subclades.

(CIDRAP News) – A World Health Organization (WHO) reference laboratory confirmed today that a 9-year-old Indonesian girl from the remote Garut district in West Java province who died on Aug 15 had H5N1 avian influenza virus.

(CIDRAP News) – West Nile fever may not be the benign illness it's usually considered to be, according to findings from a North Dakota research group.

Patients who have had West Nile virus infections can continue to experience troubling symptoms, even a year after their illness, the researchers found.

(CIDRAP News) –The federal government announced today that two swans in Michigan tested positive for both the H5 and N1 avian influenza subtypes, but initial genetic sequencing suggests that it is a low-pathogenic type rather than the highly pathogenic H5N1 strain spreading through birds in Asia, Europe, and Africa and causing deaths in humans.

(CIDRAP News) – A World Health Organization (WHO) reference laboratory confirmed today that a 62-year-old Chinese man from the far northwestern province of Xinjiang who died Jul 12 had H5N1 avian influenza. The WHO also confirmed another H5N1 case in Indonesia.

The Chinese man developed symptoms Jun 19, according to a WHO update today, and initial tests were negative. Tests repeated in July and August, however, produced positive results.

(CIDRAP News) – Canadian authorities have concluded their investigation of the sixth case of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), confirmed on Jul 3 in a cow from Manitoba.

(CIDRAP News) – US agriculture and interior secretaries announced yesterday that their departments are expanding wild bird monitoring for H5N1 avian influenza beyond Alaska in partnerships with the lower 48 states, Hawaii, and other Pacific islands.

August 10, 2006 (CIDRAP News) – An outbreak of anthrax that began in early July, the largest ever recorded in Saskatchewan, has now killed at least 746 farm animals in that province and neighboring Manitoba, according to Aug 9 statistics from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA).

(CIDRAP News) – The number of deaths in a Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever (CCHF) outbreak in Turkey has increased to 20, with a total of 242 cases, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported yesterday.

Since WHO's last update on the outbreak on Jun 30 there have been 92 new cases and 9 new deaths. One of the fatalities involved a healthcare worker who acquired the infection while treating a patient with CCHF.

(CIDRAP News) – The World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed today that a 17-year-old girl who died yesterday in Jakarta province had H5N1 avian influenza, marking the country's second case this week.

The WHO statement said the case was confirmed by Indonesia's Ministry of Health. Indonesia's case count now stands at 56 cases with 44 deaths—the most deaths in any country to date.