The US Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) yesterday issued a public health alert over the risk of Salmonella infection related to preparing and consuming whole hogs for pig roasts, after investigation into a recent outbreak in Washington state linked illnesses to Kapowsin Meats for a second year in a row.
In its weekly yellow fever situation report, the World Health Organization (WHO) today noted 73 more cases of the disease in Angola, bringing that country's suspected cases to 3,625.
Saudi Arabia's Ministry of Health (MOH) reported a new MERS-CoV infection, involving an 80-year-old woman from Jeddah who is a household contact of an earlier confirmed patient, and the World Health Organization (WHO) yesterday filled in more details about 13 recently reported cases from the country, 5 linked to a Riyadh hospital outbreak and at least 3 that appear to be linked to small clusters in Jeddah and Najran.
After reporting an H5N1 avian flu outbreak in poultry 2 days ago, Vietnam reported another one yesterday, this one affecting a village flock in Ninh Thuan province in the southern part of the country, according to a report filed by animal health authorities with the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE).
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) waited until last week to set a policy to centralize reporting of all lab mishaps within the agency despite previous high-profile lab accidents and promises of change, according to a USA Today story yesterday.
Blue Bell Creameries, which has been linked to 10 listeriosis cases in four states in an outbreak that spans several years, had evidence of Listeria in its Oklahoma plant as early as March 2013, a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) report today said, according to an Associated Press (AP) story.
The number of chikungunya infections in the Americas has increased to 1,343,372, a rise of 32,504, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) said in its latest update. The bump in cases was slightly higher than the 28,768-case increase recorded the week before.
As part of an ongoing federal review of gain-of-function (GOF) research on H5N1 avian influenza and other disease threats, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) on Mar 10 awarded a contract to Gryphon Scientific to formally assess the risks and benefits.
The rate of two important healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) in critically ill children decreased substantially from 2007 to 2012, an important factor in patient outcomes as well as in monetary savings, according to findings of a study yesterday in Pediatrics.
A search of government labs in the wake of a July discovery of old vials of smallpox virus has turned up additional improperly stored pathogens that cause plague, tularemia, melioidosis, botulism, and a certain foodborne disease, as well as the toxin ricin, the Washington Post reported today.
