Category: Emerging Infectious Diseases
Health officials investigate mystery disease in southwest Congo after 143 deaths
CNN A flu-like disease that has killed dozens of people over two weeks is being investigated in southwestern Congo, local authorities said. The deaths were recorded between Nov. 10 and Nov. 25 in the Panzi health zone of Kwango province. Symptoms include fever, headache, cough and anaemia, provincial health minister Apollinaire Yumba told reporters over the […]
Dec 4, 2024
Are flu and COVID high now? Here’s how the season has started
CBS News This year’s winter surge of influenza and COVID-19 has yet to arrive for most of the country, data published this week by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows, with trends so far a fraction of what they were at this time last year. “COVID-19 activity remains low and is stable in most areas. Seasonal influenza […]
Dec 4, 2024
Oregon confirms first human case of bird flu out of Clackamas County
The World The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed that a person contracted bird flu in a case linked to an outbreak that sickened thousands of birds in a Clackamas County commercial poultry operation. Public health officials declined to provide details about the person, name the operation or other details. They also said there […]
Dec 3, 2024
H5N1 Bird Flu Concerns Grow. Are COVID-19 Mistakes Being Repeated?
Forbes There’s a saying that those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Will that be the case with the H5N1 avian influenza virus that’s been spreading among birds for years, jumped to dairy cattle earlier this year and appeared in a pig a month ago? Is hindsight not 2020? Are […]
Dec 3, 2024
Health officials investigate mystery disease in southwest Congo after 143 deaths
AP A flu-like disease that has killed dozens of people over two weeks is being investigated in southwestern Congo, local authorities said. The deaths were recorded between Nov. 10 and Nov. 25 in the Panzi health zone of Kwango province. Symptoms include fever, headache, cough and anaemia, provincial health minister Apollinaire Yumba told reporters over the […]
Dec 3, 2024
Influenza A(H5N1) shedding in air corresponds to transmissibility in mammals
Nature An increase in spillover events of highly pathogenic avian influenza A(H5N1) viruses to mammals suggests selection of viruses that transmit well in mammals. Here we use air-sampling devices to continuously sample infectious influenza viruses expelled by experimentally infected ferrets. The resulting quantitative virus shedding kinetics data resembled ferret-to-ferret transmission studies and indicated that the […]
Dec 3, 2024
The truth about raw milk and why experts are ‘absolutely horrified’ by the trend
Guardian US officials recently detected bird flu in raw milk. Public health officials in California detected bird flu in a sample of raw milk this month. The virus first spread to dairy cattle in the US in March. The discovery comes amid an increasingly heated public debate about the merits and drawbacks of raw milk. Robert F Kennedy Jr, […]
Nov 27, 2024
Experts say bird flu is more widespread than we think: ‘We are in a soup of virus’
Independent Scientists are warning about the continued transmission of dangerous H5N1 bird flu, saying that the virus is more widespread than believed. “We are in a soup of virus. I mean, there’s virus everywhere around us at this point,” Dr. Marcela Uhart, a wildlife veterinarian with the University of Cal-Davis’ One Health Institute, told a symposium earlier this […]
Nov 27, 2024
Why a teenager’s bird-flu infection is ringing alarm bells for scientists
Nature A strain of avian influenza is showing signs of adaptation to human hosts, but there is no evidence that it can transmit from person to person. In a children’s hospital in Vancouver, Canada, a teenager is in critical condition after being infected with an avian influenza virus that has researchers on high alert. Viral genome sequences […]
Nov 27, 2024
B.C. teen remains in critical condition with H5N1 avian flu
Toronto News B.C. provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry said the teen infected with H5N1 avian flu remains in critical condition in Children’s Hospital. Henry said the teen is “stable” and has made some progress in the past few days, but is still “very sick.” In addition, Henry said 34 health-care workers were exposed to avian flu but […]
Nov 27, 2024