Public Health

Sept 1, 2006 (CIDRAP News) – The nation's largest public health organization sounded an alarm this week about the public health workforce, citing a current shortage and projecting that the profession could lose up to half of its workers over the next few years.

(CIDRAP News) – Now that most states have issued preliminary or final plans for dealing with pandemic influenza, a group of experts who looked at the public health strategies in the plans has given them a mixed review.

(CIDRAP News) – Leading medical researchers yesterday announced the formation of a consortium to unlock genetic and other data on avian influenza in the hope of improving the understanding of how viruses such as H5N1 spread and evolve.

(CIDRAP News) – The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has published the genetic blueprints for more than 650 influenza virus genes to launch a new data-sharing program intended to stimulate influenza research.

(CIDRAP News) – US health officials broke new ground last week by approving the use of a mixture of bacteriophages, or bacteria-killing viruses, to control the pathogen Listeria monocytogenes on ready-to-eat (RTE) meat and poultry products.

(CIDRAP News) – US agriculture and interior secretaries announced yesterday that their departments are expanding wild bird monitoring for H5N1 avian influenza beyond Alaska in partnerships with the lower 48 states, Hawaii, and other Pacific islands.

(CIDRAP News) – For the seventh year in a row, cases of tularemia are being reported on Martha's Vineyard, where six cases of the rare respiratory form of the disease have occurred so far.

The Massachusetts Department of Public Health (MDPH) in a Jul 27 press release said that the patients, ages 33 to 67, became ill between May 13 and Jul 5. All have been successfully treated and are recovering. Four of the six are employed as landscapers.

(CIDRAP News) – The US government announced Jul 28 that it will add 10,000 courses of anthrax immune globulin (AIG) to the strategic national stockpile.

(CIDRAP News) – The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has created a new position that involves directing the evaluation of products for emerging and pandemic disease threats and has named veteran staff member Mark Goldberger, MD, MPH, to fill it.

Goldberger has been appointed "medical director for emerging and pandemic disease threats" in the FDA's Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER), the agency announced yesterday.

(CIDRAP News) – A US Senate committee today approved a bill packed with a wide variety of provisions designed to improve the nation's ability to handle public health emergencies, including pandemic influenza.