Category: Emerging Infectious Diseases
Five things about covid we still don’t understand at our peril
Washington Post – In less than three years, researchers have published more than 200,000 studies about the virus and covid-19. That is four times the number of scientific papers written on influenza in the past century and more than 10 times the number written on measles. Still, the virus has kept many of its secrets, […]
Sep 26, 2022
Ebola Deaths Double With Outbreak Spreading in Central Uganda
Bloomberg – Two new districts reported cases of the Ebola-Sudan strain of the viral hemorrhagic illness after it was first detected in the central Mubende district on Sept. 20. At least 34 people have contracted the disease and 21 have died, the Kampala-based Ministry of Health said on Twitter late Sunday.
Sep 26, 2022
Monkeypox in a Young Infant
CDC – In August 2022, the Florida Department of Health (FDOH) was notified of a suspected case of monkeypox in an infant aged <2 months who was admitted to a Florida hospital with a rash and cellulitis. This case report highlights findings from the related epidemiologic investigation and describes the public health actions taken. This […]
Sep 26, 2022
Neurologic Complications of Smallpox and Monkeypox
JAMA Neurology – Orthopox viruses include smallpox virus, a once feared but now eradicated virus, as well as monkeypox virus. Monkeypox is an emerging virus initially isolated in 1958, previously unrecognized outside sub-Saharan Africa until a worldwide outbreak in May 2022. It is important to review known neurologic consequences of both these viruses, as complications […]
Sep 26, 2022
How smallpox and monkeypox viruses affect the nervous system
Medical News.Net – Several pandemics have emerged over the past few decades due to the emergence of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which causes acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), as well as Dengue, Zika, Ebola, and West Nile viruses. Most recently, the emergence of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) led to the coronavirus […]
Sep 26, 2022
Uganda says Ebola caseload rises to 16 as outbreak grows
VOA – Uganda said on Sunday its Ebola caseload had jumped to 16 people while a further 18 people also likely had the disease, fueling fears of a spreading outbreak that involves a strain for which a vaccine has not yet been found. In a tweet, the Ministry of Health also said the death toll […]
Sep 25, 2022
New Jersey: Kids are pouring into hospitals. A spate of respiratory illness is filling pediatric beds
NJ.com – New Jersey hospitals are filling up with kids coughing and struggling to breathe. But it’s not COVID-19. Or even influenza. An outbreak of viral respiratory infections is sending children to emergency rooms throughout the state. The biggest culprits are enterovirus and rhinovirus as well as a few cases of RSV (respiratory syncytial virus), all of which usually […]
Sep 24, 2022
Nearly 225,000 Americans have died of COVID-19 since the start of 2022 despite viral declines, data shows
ABC News – Although the daily death rates have ticked down slightly from August, updated federal data shows that the U.S. is still losing hundreds of Americans to COVID-19 every day, and 225,000 people in the U.S. have been lost to the virus since the start of 2022. On average, more than 350 American deaths […]
Sep 23, 2022
New COVID variants may evade current treatments—or render them entirely ineffective, experts say
Fortune – Future COVID variants are expected to be more transmissible and perhaps better at evading the immune system. And they might even render treatments for patients like monoclonal antibodies “less effective,” the World Health Organization’s pandemic lead said Thursday. Van Kerkhove said that the WHO is keeping an eye on Omicron variants BA.5—currently dominant […]
Sep 23, 2022