News Scan for Oct 20, 2015

News brief

Hospital upgrades nurse Ebola survivor's condition to serious but stable

The condition of a Scottish nurse who is hospitalized with neurologic complications following an Ebola infection has been upgraded from critical to serious but stable, Royal Free London hospital said yesterday in an update.

Pauline Cafferkey got sick with Ebola late last December upon her return home from serving in Sierra Leone. She was treated at Royal Free London's high-containment unit and was discharged from the hospital late the following month after blood tests showed she was free of the virus.

She was hospitalized again on Oct 9 at the same facility, however, with what authorities said was an unusual late complication from the disease.

Health officials have said her complications are neurologic and that traces of the virus were found in her spinal fluid. Her case raises issues about long-term consequences of Ebola in survivors and risks that may linger in patients and their contacts.
Oct 19 Royal Free London statement

CDC launches redesigned FOOD Tool for foodborne outbreaks

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) today released a retooled online platform to simplify and enhance searching more than 15 years' of data on US foodborne disease outbreaks, the agency said in a news release.

The updated Foodborne Outbreak Online Database Tool (FOOD Tool) lets users search by state, food, or pathogen. The FOOD Tool, first unveiled in 2009, includes national foodborne outbreak data reported to CDC from 1998 to 2014. New interactive features such as maps, graphs, and tables enable searches by specific foods and ingredients, view a "quick stats" display, and get case counts for multistate outbreaks.

FOOD Tool's data come from the CDC's Foodborne Disease Outbreak Surveillance System, which contains information on foodborne outbreaks caused by intestinal bacteria, viruses, parasites, and chemical agents reported by state, local, and territorial public health agencies.

About one in six Americans get sick from foodborne illness annually, the agency said.
Oct 20 CDC news release
CDC FOOD Tool
FOOD Tool FAQ

Flu Scan for Oct 20, 2015

News brief

Southern Hemisphere flu activity continues to ebb

Levels of flu and other respiratory viruses are declining in the Southern Hemisphere, with little activity or only sporadic detections elsewhere, the World Health Organization (WHO) said in a global flu update yesterday, based on data as of the first week of October.

The only exceptions are Cuba, which reported high numbers of severe respiratory infections, mainly related to the 2009 H1N1 strain and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), India, and Laos. India's flu activity is mainly due to 2009 H1N1, while H3N2 is responsible for most of the flu activity in Laos.

Flu activity in Australia and New Zealand is declining after peaks in the middle of August. Influenza B is the current dominant strain there, and flu levels in New Zealand are just above the seasonal threshold, according to the WHO.

Flu levels were at low or interseasonal levels in Northern Hemisphere countries.

Of flu viruses recently characterized by national influenza centers, about 67% were influenza A, and of the subtyped influenza A samples, 70% were H3N2 and the rest 2009 H1N1. Of the flu B viruses that were characterized, 67% belonged to the Yamagata lineage, the one recommended for Northern Hemisphere trivalent seasonal flu vaccines.
Oct 19 WHO global flu update

Nigeria reports 3 H5N1 outbreaks affecting 6,000 poultry

Nigeria is reporting three more outbreaks of H5N1 avian flu in farm poultry in Rivers state, the country's hardest-hit region, according to a report posted by the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) yesterday.

The outbreaks began Oct 13 or Oct 15 in flocks ranging from 257 to 3,000 egg-laying chickens. All told, 510 of 6,157 susceptible birds died from the disease, and the rest were culled to prevent disease spread. Samples tested positive on Oct 17.

Response measures such as disinfection of the premises and control of poultry movement have been deployed, agriculture officials said. The country has had 95 H5N1 outbreaks so far this year.
Oct 19 OIE report