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(CIDRAP News) – The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) yesterday announced the awarding of $24 million to fund state and local projects aimed at innovative approaches to boost the nation's readiness for an influenza pandemic.

(CIDRAP News) – An agriculture ministry official in Indonesia who spoke yesterday at a pandemic planning conference for businesses said the number of poultry outbreaks caused by the H5N1 avian influenza virus is declining.

(CIDRAP News) – Public health and medical leaders predicted today that this year's influenza vaccine will match up well with circulating flu viruses—unlike last year's vaccine—and that plenty of doses will be available.

(CIDRAP News) – Two organizations recently reported winning US government contracts for research on drugs that could work against multiple bioterror-related diseases such as plague, tularemia, and anthrax.

Editor's note: The second paragraph of this story was revised on Sep 24 to correct an error. On the basis of information from ProMED-mail (published by the International Society for Infectious Diseases), the original version said it was unusual for the southern hemisphere vaccine composition to be the same as the preceding northern hemisphere vaccine. A later ProMED-mail posting made clear that this is not unusual.

(CIDRAP News) – The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) suggests in a new report that an increased focus on the development of vaccine adjuvants could save the US government money while improving the nation's preparedness for an influenza pandemic.

(CIDRAP News) – Sen. Patrick Leahy, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee and a target of the 2001 anthrax attacks, said this week that he disbelieves the FBI's conclusion that Dr. Bruce E. Ivins was the sole perpetrator of the attacks, according to news services.

(CIDRAP News) – The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) today released a report detailing the first year of its public health "do not board" (DNB) list, a new tool designed to prohibit those with serious communicable diseases from flying into or out of the country.

Data from the first year of the program, from June 2008 to May 2008, appear today in the Sep 19 issue of Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR).

(CIDRAP News) – A study conducted in Bangladesh suggests that an influenza shot during pregnancy lowers the risk of influenza both for the woman and for the baby in the first 6 months of life.

(CIDRAP News) – Nine research  teams that  shared $2 million from Fresh Express, a California produce company, recently presented their findings on Escherichia coli O157:H7, revealing some clues on the pathogen's behavior on leafy greens that could lead to safer produce.

(CIDRAP News) – An outbreak of Escherichia coli O111 infections in Oklahoma seems to have run its course after sickening 314 people, putting 72 in hospitals, and killing one, Oklahoma officials announced yesterday.

The Oklahoma State Department of Health (OSDH) said that the last known case-patient fell ill Sep 6 and that it believed the outbreak was over.

Agriculture officials in Togo today confirmed that the H5N1 avian influenza virus was responsible for suspicious poultry deaths that had recently been reported in a village in the southern part of the country.

(CIDRAP News) – The FBI plans to ask the National Academy of Sciences to review the bureau's investigation that led to its conclusion that government microbiologist Bruce E. Ivins committed the 2001 anthrax attacks, FBI Director Robert Mueller III told Congress today.

(CIDRAP News) – The number of people involved in a restaurant-related outbreak of an uncommon strain of Escherichia coli has risen to 291, including 67 who were hospitalized, Oklahoma officials reported recently.

Sixteen of the hospital patients have received kidney dialysis treatment, the Oklahoma State Department of Health (OSDH) reported in its latest official update on Sep 12. One person, a 26-year-old man, has died in the outbreak.

(CIDRAP News) – The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) says it has hired 104 people in its Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN) in the past 5 months as part of a surge that has brought more than 1,300 new employees to the agency.

(CIDRAP News) – Public health officials in Hong Kong made headlines in March when they closed schools for 2 weeks to put a damper on an influenza epidemic, but a new report says the measure appears to have had little effect.

(CIDRAP News) – Xoma Ltd., a Berkeley, Calif., pharmaceutical company, recently announced that it received a $65 million multiyear federal contract to fund work on botulinum antitoxins, one of which it hopes to put through safety and efficacy tests starting in 2009.

(CIDRAP News) – Cross-contamination of clinical specimens in two Idaho hospital laboratories that were conducting proficiency tests triggered brief concern about a potential anthrax attack in 2006, underscoring the value of proper lab practices, according to a report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

(CIDRAP News) – A government official in Laos yesterday said the H5N1 avian influenza virus has been detected in ducks in one of the country's provinces, the same day Togo's health ministry announced that avian influenza struck a poultry farm near that country's capital.

(CIDRAP News) – A bipartisan commission of former US government officials , in issuing a report card today on the federal government's progress toward preventing terrorist attacks with weapons of mass destruction (WMD), gave the nation a C- for its efforts to reduce the threat of bioterrorism.