UNICEF said today that it is helping Samoa's government respond to a measles outbreak that has grown to more than 1,000 suspected cases, with 14 deaths in children younger than 5 years old and 1 in an adult.
The Florida Department of Health confirmed the state's 11th locally transmitted dengue case of 2019, in Miami-Dade County, officials said yesterday. The case does not appear to be related to previously reported cases.
The European Public Health Alliance's Stakeholder Network on Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) has released a roadmap outlining the path European leaders should take in their efforts to fight drug-resistant infections.
Emphasizing the need for a multidisciplinary, "One Health" approach, the roadmap calls for European Union (EU) member states and institutions to pursue five strategies against AMR:
A study of hospitalized patients in the US military health system database shows that carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE) infections are associated with longer and more costly hospitalizations and a significant increase in the risk of in-hospital death, researchers reported yesterday in the American Journal of Infection Control.
An analysis of outpatient antibiotic prescriptions in Tennessee in 2016 shows that a small number of prescribers were responsible for a "dramatically disproportionate" number of prescriptions, researchers reported today in Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology.
Our weekly wrap-up of antimicrobial stewardship & antimicrobial resistance scans
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said a multistate outbreak of Escherichia coli is connected to romaine lettuce grown in the Salinas, California growing region and is advising people not to eat romaine from that area.
A comprehensive educational antimicrobial stewardship program (ASP) implemented in 214 Spanish primary care clinics was tied to improved use of antibiotics and a sustained reduction of infections caused by extended-spectrum beta-lactamase (ESBL)-producing Escherichia coli, according to a new study in The Lancet Infectious Diseases.
An analysis of flu viruses during Japan's 2019 flu season suggests that 2009 H1N1 and H3N2 viruses can rapidly acquire the I38T mutation in the polymerase acidic (PA) protein, which has been linked to reduce susceptibility to baloxavir marboxil, a new antiviral. A team based Japan reported their findings yesterday in Nature Microbiology.
The recent Lassa fever infections, one of them fatal, of two Dutch citizens working in Sierra Leone, along with related high-risk exposures in three United Kingdom citizens, are part of a healthcare Lassa cluster, according to new details about the event in the World Health Organization (WHO) African regional office's weekly outbreaks and emergencies update.
Scientists from Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology report that a diagnostic test they developed allows simultaneous detection of genotype and phenotype, enabling rapid and accurate antibiotic susceptibility determination in under 4 hours, according to their findings detailed in a letter in Nature Medicine.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said yesterday that 27 more people have been sickened in an Escherichia coli outbreak tied to romaine lettuce grown near Salinas, California.
Originally published by CIDRAP News Nov 27
The Samoan government will temporarily close later this week to allow officials to focus on the country's growing measles outbreak, which has resulted in more than 3,700 cases and in 53 deaths since October, the Washington Post reported today.
A study of Australian children has found that only 1 in 5 with a reported non–beta-lactam antibiotic (NBLA) allergy had a true allergy, Australian researchers reported today in Pediatrics.
Public Health England (PHE) today confirmed that a person in the southwest of England has been diagnosed as having monkeypox, likely contracted after a recent visit to Nigeria.
The United Kingdom documented its first cases of the rare virus last year, in two patients who also likely contracted the disease in Nigeria, plus a case involving a healthcare worker—the first instance of spread of the disease in the country.
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) today approved a new test to diagnose methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), which will allow health workers to screen patients for MRSA colonization more quickly—in as little as 5 hours compared with 24 to 48 hours for traditional culture-based tests.
A review of national documents shows that fewer than half of European countries have implemented publicly accessible mandatory surveillance of at least one of the World Health Organization's (WHO's) priority pathogens, European researchers reported yesterday in Clinical Microbiology and Infection.
Afghanistan has one new case of wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1), and Angola recorded 16 new cases of circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 (cVDPV2) according to the latest weekly report from the Global Polio Eradication Intuitive (GPEI).
A multifaceted outpatient stewardship intervention at Veterans Affairs primary care clinics in Pennsylvania was associated with sustained reductions in overall, unnecessary, and suboptimal antibiotic prescription rates for up to a year after some components were discontinued, researchers reported today in Clinical Infectious Diseases.
According to Avian Flu Diary, an infectious disease tracking blog, Taiwan's Centers for Disease Control and Ministry of Health today reported two human cases of H9N2 avian flu originating in mainland China were reported to the World Health Organization in November.
A survey of health insurance claims made in the United States from 2007 through 2018 shows that claim lines with a diagnosis of Lyme disease increased 117%. The information is included in a white paper published today by FAIR Health, an independent nonprofit organization dedicated to healthcare costs and health insurance information.
A review of Medicaid claims in Kentucky from 2012 through 2016 found that cefdinir prescriptions for treating outpatient pediatric infections has increased over the study period, researchers based at the University of Kentucky reported today in the Journal of the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society.
Patients with severe flu treated with a combination of the antiviral drugs favipiravir and oseltamivir compared with oseltamivir (Tamiflu) alone had faster recoveries, according to findings published today in The Journal of Infectious Diseases.
