Author: Claudinne Miller
Are We on the Cusp of a Major Bird Flu Outbreak?
Harvard Med Scientists weigh in on the spread of H5N1 and highlight clues that portend what might come next. Bird flu, or H5N1 avian influenza, has been circulating across North America since 2022, infecting birds, livestock, wildlife, pets, and humans. Despite 70 documented human cases, there are no known instances of human-to-human transmission — but […]
Mar 12, 2025
Health Secretary RFK Jr. Calls for Intensive Testing of Bird Flu Drugs on Poultry
Bloomberg Therapeutic drugs should be “intensively” tested on US poultry flocks infected with bird flu, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said, arguing that the medications could help identify treatments for human cases. In an interview with Fox News’ Sean Hannity broadcast on Tuesday night, Kennedy said he opposed mass vaccination and culling as a strategy […]
Mar 12, 2025
H5N1 flu is now killing birds on the continent of Antarctica
New Scientist A highly pathogenic strain of bird flu is spreading south along the Antarctic Peninsula and could devastate populations of penguins and other seabirds. H5N1 bird flu has been found in dead birds on Antarctica for the first time. The deadly strain of bird flu is currently spreading south along the Antarctic Peninsula and […]
Mar 12, 2025
The Artifacts of New York’s Pandemic Era
NYT Stuck to lampposts and floorboards, reminders of Covid’s darkest days are everywhere. The vintage aura of Sevilla Restaurant — the servers in bow ties, the leather booths, the glow of lanterns — reflects a bygone era of the West Village in Manhattan, where the establishment was founded almost a century ago. But alongside those […]
Mar 12, 2025
Measles cases in Texas, New Mexico rise by 28 in five days as outbreak spreads
Reuters Texas and New Mexico on Tuesday reported an increase of 28 cases of measles in the last five days, bringing the total known infections to 256 in the two states since an outbreak began in late January. The outbreak, which started in West Texas, caused the first U.S. measles deaths in a decade. It […]
Mar 12, 2025
A Clearer Picture of Covid’s Lasting Effects on the Body
NYT Five years on, scientists are starting to understand how the virus can lead to long-term, sometimes invisible changes. Five years — and hundreds of millions of cases — after the World Health Organization declared the Covid-19 pandemic, scientists are getting a clearer picture of how the virus can affect the body long after an […]
Mar 12, 2025
5 years since the pandemic started, long COVID patients are still hoping for a cure
NPR It’s been five years since COVID-19 was declared a pandemic. But many patients with long COVID have yet to find meaningful recovery. Around 6% of adults in the U.S. — or roughly 18 million — are estimated to be living with the damaging aftermath of catching the virus, according to research and a long-running survey of U.S […]
Mar 12, 2025
Five years of Covid exacted a terrible toll. Another epidemic has claimed even more lives
STAT We lost sight of the fact that more young people were dying from drug overdoses than from Covid’ The 2020s have inarguably been Covid-19’s decade. Since the coronavirus outbreak was acknowledged as a pandemic exactly five years ago, the pandemic has killed well over 1 million Americans, derailed the global economy, and sparked political upheaval […]
Mar 11, 2025
This is what it looks like when parasitic worms directly invade your brain
ARS Technica Doctors in China inadvertently took time-series images of parasitic worms actively invading a woman’s brain and causing rare and rapidly progressing lesions. The previously healthy 60-year-old woman went to the hospital after having a fever and altered mental status for three days, according to a report of her case published Monday in JAMA Neurology. […]
Mar 11, 2025
COVID Broke the Rules of Virus Evolution
The Atlantic Why did this coronavirus change faster than scientists expected? In the early, uncertain days of the coronavirus pandemic, scientists delivered one comforting pronouncement: The virus that caused COVID mutates rather slowly. If that remained true, the virus would not change much to become more dangerous soon, and any vaccine could provide years of durable protection. What […]
Mar 11, 2025