Category: Emerging Infectious Diseases
Delaware County confirms tuberculosis case at William Penn School District
(NPR) The Delaware County Health Department is confirming a case of tuberculosis at Penn Wood Middle School in the William Penn School District. The district notified the county Health Department on Sunday. Health officials are working in concert with the district to locate people who may have been exposed to the individual. “The general public […]
Jan 24, 2023
UNMC Global Center for Health Security Infectious Disease Briefing Infectious Disease Briefing
By Dr. Joseph Fauver SARS-CoV-2 Variant Update
Jan 24, 2023
How your first brush with COVID warps your immunity
(Nature) The immune system responds more strongly to the strain of a virus that it first met, weakening response to other strains. Can this ‘imprinting’ be overcome? During the summer of 2022, with the Omicron coronavirus variant running rampant, friends and relatives of immunologist Bob Seder kept asking him if they should postpone their COVID-19 […]
Jan 24, 2023
COVID-19 Infection May Induce Fetal Brain Hemorrhages, Scientists Warn
(Science Alert) There are already plenty of reasons to worry about COVID-19, but there’s another to add to the list: There’s evidence of the virus in fetal brain tissue in instances of pregnant people passing the infection to their children. So it’s not just the effects of the illness on our bodies that are of concern, but also […]
Jan 24, 2023
An ‘unprecedented pandemic of avian flu’ is wreaking havoc on the U.S. poultry industry. Humans may be at risk too, experts warn
(Fortune) The H5N1 strain of avian flu responsible for the deaths of tens of millions of birds in the U.S. in recent months, and countless more worldwide, poses an existential threat to the poultry industry in the U.S.—and a potentially widespread human health threat, experts say. The strain—first identified in domestic waterfowl in China in […]
Jan 24, 2023
Bird Flu Warning: Its Spreading, Mutating, and Infecting Mammals
(Infection Control Today) As many of us remain focused on COVID-19 and its immunosuppressive augmentation of other infectious diseases, mother nature is not sitting still. I was again reminded of this fact when I attempted to purchase a dozen eggs for over $6. The average price in the United States was over $4 in December 2022. […]
Jan 23, 2023
The doctor won’t see you now: Covid winters are making long hospital waits the new normal
(Washington Post) As the United States enters its third full covid winter, a top administration official is warning that the permanence of the coronavirus in the disease landscape could mean brutal and long-lasting seasonal surges of cold-weather illnesses for years to come, resulting in hospitals struggling to care for non-covid emergencies and unable to give patients timely, lifesaving treatments. Winter […]
Jan 17, 2023
The Genetic Mutation That Makes ‘Kraken’ Covid So Contagious
(Rolling Stone) A particular change in the spike protein means the virus is spreading faster than ever. There is a new, more contagious form of the novel-coronavirus. It’s got a greater ability to evade our antibodies. And it’s spreading easier than ever. You’ve read these words before, and you’ll almost certainly read them again as the Covid pandemic […]
Jan 17, 2023
Why kids are “great little vectors” for COVID-19
(AMA) Offering new revelations on the behavior of SARS-CoV-2, a National Institutes of Health (NIH) study suggests that young children and people with obesity may be significant vectors of viral transmission in households. NIH’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) enlisted scientists from Henry Ford Health and other groups to participate in the project, which focused on […]
Jan 17, 2023
The quiet cost of covid: A million people missing work each month
(Washington Post) Some 1.5 million people missed work because of an illness last month, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The month before that, it was 1.6 million. In October, 1.3 million and in September 1.2 million. In fact, the last time there were fewer than a million Americans missing work because of an illness […]
Jan 17, 2023