UK labs that handle the most dangerous pathogens have reported at least 116 accidents or other biosecurity breaches in the past 5 years—about one every 2 weeks—The Guardian reported today.
Saudi Arabia's Ministry of Health (MOH) today reported two new MERS-CoV cases and one recovery in a previously reported patient. Both new cases occurred in Taif, and the MOH says that both patients are in critical condition.
The recent pattern of a Saudi MERS-CoV case or two a day changed today, as the country's Ministry of Health (MOH) confirmed 6 new cases, 3 of them in Taif and 1 of those fatal.
Resistance to artemisinin, the main drug for treating malaria, has now spread throughout Southeast Asia, including critical border regions, and a genetic mutation in the Plasmodium falciparum parasite that causes the disease may be the culprit, according to a study today in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Researchers who analyzed the genome of a new coronavirus (CoV) from a South African bat sample demonstrated that it may be the ancestor of MERS-CoV, that a host switch from bats to camels may have taken place in Africa, and that camels are likely infecting humans rather than vice versa, according to a study yesterday in the Journal of Virology.
California has logged 1,100 new cases of pertussis (whooping cough) in the past 2 weeks, bringing its season total to 4,558, almost twice as many as in all of 2013, the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) said today in a news release.
California health officials today upgraded pertussis activity in the state to epidemic status, with more than 800 cases reported over the past 2 weeks, according to a statement from the California Department of Public Health (CDPH)
China's Guangdong province reported another H7N9 influenza infection, along with a death in a previously reported case, according to a May 2 health department statement translated and posted by FluTrackers, an infectious disease news message board.
The patient is a 53-year-old woman from Shenzhen who suffers from chronic bronchitis. She is hospitalized in stable condition.
A measles outbreak in the Fraser Valley east of Vancouver has temporarily closed a school in eastern British Columbia after sickening nearly 100 students, and vaccine is being distributed to pharmacies and physicians' offices as the outbreak spreads from the school into the nearby communities, according to news sources this week.
Protection from three doses of pertussis vaccine against disease requiring hospitalization waned significantly even by 4 years of age, Australian researchers reported yesterday in Pediatrics, a finding that supports current US recommendations of four early doses.
The World Health Organization (WHO) today confirmed the two most recent cases of Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) in Saudi Arabia, in 51- and 26-year-old women.
The agency offered a few new details in the cases, which were first reported by Saudi officials on Dec 5.
The World Health Organization (WHO) today confirmed three cases of Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) infection in Saudi Arabia that the country's Ministry of Health (MOH) first reported last week. Two of the cases proved fatal.
As has been the pattern with Saudi MERS-CoV cases, the WHO report contained little information on the cases.
Saudi Arabia has reported two more Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) cases in the past few days, both in men living in the Riyadh region, according to a press account and a translated government statement.
Clusters of children who had nonmedical exemptions (NMEs) from vaccines appears to be one of several factors that played a role in California's 2010 pertussis (whooping cough) epidemic, researchers reported today in Pediatrics.
Researchers from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) report that a small study in macaques has shown promise of using a two-drug combination against infection with Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV), according to study findings published yesterday in Nature Medicine.
Alfred Almanza, head of the US Department of Agriculture's (USDA's) Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS), took issue with a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report this week that was critical of some aspects of an FSIS poultry inspection plan, saying the GAO omitted key details.
The GAO report asserted that the USDA took some shortcuts in assessing the plan, called the HACCP-Based Inspection Models Project (HIMP).
An analysis of Dallas County's massive West Nile virus (WNV) outbreak in 2012 found that it was preceded by an unusually mild winter and favored previously known hot spots, researchers reported today in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).
A working group for a vaccine advisory board recommended against a second dose of Tdap vaccine for teens, citing lack of a booster effect.
Twelve more hepatitis A infections are under investigation in a hepatitis A outbreak linked to a frozen berry blend, raising the number of suspected cases to 118, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported yesterday.
May 20, 2013
