For the first time since 2009, the World Health Organization (WHO) updated its pandemic influenza guidance, emphasizing the need for better tracking during the human-to-human transmission phase. The new guidance was published yesterday.
The WHO defined and named phases of an influenza pandemic. In the alert phase, when human-to-human transmission begins, the agency said there is no need for case-counting.
The world rarely receives advance notice of a significant public health threat, but the detection of the highly pathogenic form of H7N9 avian influenza in China serves as a second warning, an expert from the World Health Organization's collaborating center in Australia said today in a Cell Research commentary.
The Saudi Arabian Ministry of Health (MOH) reported a new case of MERS-CoV infection in Az Zulfi in the central part of the country near Riyadh.
"It seems we've lost an understanding of the difference between a pandemic and an epidemic."
The PATH analysis discusses progress, outlines the risk, and recommends key actions.
In a stunning development that played out over the weekend, news surfaced that WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus appointed 93-year-old Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe as goodwill ambassador for noncommunicable diseases, prompting international outrage followed by a quick withdrawal of the appointment.
In a sample from a patient who died, researchers saw signs that the H7N9 virus had started to mutate to a form resistant to Tamiflu.
Slaughter of chickens infected with H5N1 avian influenza can produce airborne viruses that can infect birds and mammals, according to findings from a series of animal experiments done by a research team led by the US Department of Agriculture and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention The investigators reported their finding on Oct 6 in Emerging Infectious Diseases.
In its latest weekly FluView report today, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said it has received reports of nine more variant H3N2 (H3N2v) influenza cases, eight from Maryland and one from Michigan, its first of the year.
Comprehensive biomedical research must continue its crucial role in preparing the world for the next pandemic or other far-reaching public health emergency, whether it be caused by a novel influenza strain, Ebola, or some other transmissible pathogen, Anthony Fauci, MD, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and colleagues wrote in a commentary in the Journal
