Category: Emerging Infectious Diseases
How Bird Flu Became a Human Pandemic Threat
Scientific American The first hints that a new strain of avian illness is emerging could be found on this beach on Delaware Bay, where migrating birds flock. Here’s what virus detectives who return there every year know right now. H5N1 bird flu has been making a lot of headlines since last year, and for good […]
Jul 30, 2025
What Would It Take for Bird Flu to Spread among Humans?
Scientific American H5N1 avian influenza has long been a concerning virus. Since its discovery in 1996 in waterfowl, bird flu has occasionally caused isolated human cases that have quite often been fatal. But last year H5N1 did something strange: it started infecting cattle. The absolute oddity of this leap may have been somewhat lost in the flood of […]
Jul 30, 2025
Avian Flu Wiped Out Poultry. Now the Screwworm Is Coming for Beef.
NYT The parasitic fly that attacks warm-blooded animals was eliminated from the United States in the 1960s, but it’s creeping toward the Texas-Mexico border. First came bird flu, which led to the culling of large swaths of the nation’s poultry flocks and the soaring egg prices that helped undermine President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s re-election. […]
Jul 30, 2025
Cambodia reports 14th human H5N1 bird flu infection in 2025
BNO News Cambodia has confirmed a new human case of H5N1 avian influenza in a 26-year-old man who is currently receiving intensive medical treatment, according to health officials. It is the country’s 14th confirmed human case of H5N1 this year. The man, from Kravan village in Siem Reap Province, tested positive for the virus on […]
Jul 30, 2025
COVID infection early in pandemic linked to higher risk of cancer death, CU study finds
Denver Post Cancer survivors infected with COVID-19 in the early months of the pandemic had a higher risk of dying from dormant cells reawakening, Colorado researchers found, though they don’t know whether people who get the virus now face the same risk. Experiments in mice found that genetically modified animals were more likely to have signs of […]
Jul 30, 2025
Mainer hospitalized with tick-borne disease
Bangor Daily News A Hancock County resident has been hospitalized with the first human case of Powassan virus infection recorded by the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention this year. The adult was experiencing neurologic symptoms, according to the Maine CDC. The Powassan virus is spread through deer or woodchuck tick bites, and can […]
Jul 30, 2025
The Pandemic Appears to Have Accelerated Brain Aging, Even in People Who Never Got Covid
Wired More than five years after the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, we are still discovering the after-effects of not only the virus but also the prolonged period of stress, isolation, loss, and uncertainty that the pandemic caused. A new scientific study, published this month in Nature Communications, has revealed that the pandemic may have accelerated brain aging […]
Jul 30, 2025
Is Bird Flu Gone for Good?
Johns Hopkins U.S. bird flu infections have declined in both birds and mammals, prompting CDC to shift from weekly to monthly reporting. But is the outbreak really over? It’s not unusual for wild birds to be infected by influenza viruses. But the strain of highly pathogenic avian influenza that began causing outbreaks in the U.S. in […]
Jul 23, 2025
New study advances theory on why most U.S. bird flu cases have so far been mild
STAT Researchers believe immunity to an earlier virus may play a role, but not everyone agrees. The H5N1 bird flu virus has historically extracted a heavy toll when it infects humans, with nearly half of confirmed cases ending in death over the past three decades. But of the 70 cases reported in the United States over the […]
Jul 23, 2025
Cambodia reports 13th human case of H5N1 bird flu this year
BNO Cambodia has confirmed a new human case of H5N1 bird flu in a 6-year-old boy who is currently in intensive care, according to health officials. It is the country’s 13th confirmed human case in 2025. The child, from Bos Russey village in Tbong Khmum province, tested positive for H5N1 avian influenza on Monday. He […]
Jul 23, 2025