Polio

New Ebola cases boost West Africa total to 844, plus 518 deaths

The latest pattern in West Africa's Ebola virus disease (EVD) outbreak suggests a "mixed picture," with Guinea showing a drop-off in infections, but Sierra Leone and Liberia reporting several new cases, the World Health Organization (WHO) said today in its latest update.

Foster Farms recalls chicken linked to 621-case Salmonella outbreak

As the United States celebrated Independence Day late last week, federal officials announced that Foster Farms has recalled chicken products implicated in a Salmonella outbreak that has now reached 621 cases in 29 states.

WHO reiterates high risk of polio from central Africa

The detection this week of wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) from Equatorial Guinea in Brazilian sewage and the virus's movement from Cameroon into Equatorial Guinea point up the high risk of international spread of the virus from the western portion of central Africa, the World Health Organization (WHO) said today.

Polio virus detected in Brazilian sewage

Wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) has been isolated from sewage samples in Sao Paulo state in Brazil, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported yesterday.

The samples were collected in March at the Viracopos International Airport in Campinas in the southeastern part of the country. Tests at a national lab confirmed the virus on Jun 18, the WHO said in a statement.

Another WHO/UNICEF polio vaccine campaign begins in Syria

Syria's eighth vaccination campaign in as many months begins this week and hopes to reach 2.8 million children over 5 days, according to a news release yesterday from the World Health Organization's (WHO's) Regional Office for the Eastern Mediterranean. 

Study: Community-onset MRSA levels vary across US

A 4-year survey of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) at five medical centers across the United States found that the incidence of community-onset (CO) MRSA cases varied considerably, with trends in New York City and Los Angeles going in opposite directions, according to a report in Clinical Infectious Diseases.

2013 study finds minimal worry over H7N9 in urban and rural China

Both urban and rural residents in China interviewed in late spring and early summer last year—after the spring peak in H7N9 cases—reported fairly high exposure to poultry but fairly low anxiety about the disease, according to a study yesterday in Emerging Infectious Diseases.

New phlebovirus related to Heartland virus discovered in Tasmania

A novel tick-borne phlebovirus related to the recently discovered Heartland virus that has infected at least eight US residents has been discovered in Tasmania state, Australia, according to a report yesterday in Emerging Infectious Diseases.

Cases of chikungunya in Haiti soar above 1,500

Confirmed cases of chikungunya in Haiti have skyrocketed from 14 to 1,529 in recent days, the Associated Press (AP) reported today.

Ronald Singer, a spokesman for Haiti's health ministry, said about 900 cases of the mosquito-borne disease have been in West department, where Port-au-Prince, Haiti's capital, resides. Another 300 cases were confirmed in the country's northwest.

Pakistan responds to WHO polio alert by adding vaccination posts

The health ministry of Pakistan, the country with the most polio cases of late, has committed to setting up mandatory immunization counters for travelers at all its airports, border crossings, and seaports in response to yesterday's World Health Organization (WHO) declaration of a worldwide polio emergency, according to a story in the current issue of Pakistan Today.