The count of confirmed and probable chikungunya cases on Caribbean islands and neighboring areas reached 1,446 late last week, a spike of 411 cases in only 4 days, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) reported on Feb 7.
The ECDC said St. Martin has reached 601 cases on the French side of the island, an increase of 125 cases, and 60 on the Dutch side, which saw a dramatic 51-case increase.
The World Health Organization (WHO) is taking steps to curb infectious disease threats at refugee camps in two African nations struck by violent political unrest, South Sudan and the Central African Republic (CAR).
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).
In addition to naming risk groups, the new study found that West Nile in 2012 cost Texas over $47 million.
The World Health Organization's (WHO's) strategy for better hand hygiene in healthcare workers (HCWs) is easily implemented and can make a major impact on patient safety worldwide, says a study published today in Lancet Infectious Diseases.
West Nile virus activity is well below last summer's big spike, but cases have been reported in 42 states so far.
Influenza activity is up "considerably" in South America and southern Africa, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported today, while other scattered regions are also seeing some increase.
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 3-year-old boy from Cambodia's eastern Prey Veng province has tested positive for H5N1 avian flu, marking the country's 14th case this year, according to Xinhua, China's state news agency, today.
The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) yesterday urged its member countries to establish and maintain rapid detection and reporting systems for vancomycin resistance, based on the first isolation of vancomycin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (VRSA) in Latin America.
