A 9-year single-center study by Columbia University scientists published yesterday in Infection Control & Hospital Epidemiology found that decreases in multidrug-resistant organisms (MDROs) were likely not due to implementing universal contact precautions (UCPs).
The Saudi Arabian Ministry of Health (MOH) reported one new case of MERS-CoV on Dec 24, in the city of Afif.
A 28-year-old Saudi man is in stable condition after presenting with symptoms of MERS-CoV (Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus) infection. The MOH said the man had direct contact with camels, a known risk factor for MERS-CoV.
The World Health Organization (WHO) announced today that tests have ruled out plague in several patients in Seychelles under monitoring and treatment for probable or suspected pneumonic infections. The set of samples included one from a 34-year-old man who had returned from Madagascar and who was previously identified by the Seychelles health ministry as a probable imported case, based on a weakly positive result on a rapid test.
HPV-related head and neck cancers are dramatically higher in men than in women.
The study involved almost 5,000 women in a country with high vaccine uptake.
Researchers report a 97.4% efficacy for the 9-strain HPV vaccine.
Though coverage still isn't optimal, for the first time rates topped 60%, with the boys' level gaining ground on the girls'.
A review and meta-analysis of studies on bacterial transmission and antibiotic resistance during the annual pilgrimage to Mecca has found rising rates of resistance among certain gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria, researchers report in Travel Medicine and Infectious Disease.
In a gain-of-function (GOF) experiment, Belgian researchers showed that serial passaging of H9N2 avian flu viruses in pigs enhanced the virus's replication and transmissibility, the scientists reported yesterday in PLoS One.
A new letter published in the New England Journal of Medicine attempts to explain why Brazil saw fewer babies born with microcephaly in 2016 as compared to 2015, despite more suspected Zika infections. The authors suggest that 2016's second wave of Zika infections could have actually been another flavivirus, such as chikungunya.
