Infectious Diseases News and Research

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NIH and West African leaders to discuss current crisis of Ebola outbreak at TJU

Leaders from West African Nations and representatives from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) will attend a meeting on September 22nd from 3:00-5:15 pm at Thomas Jefferson University to discuss the current crisis and plan future collaborations.

16 Sep 2014

MSU researchers show how bacterial immune systems fight off viruses

When this week's print issue of the journal Science comes out, a collective cheer will go up from New Mexico, Montana and even the Netherlands, thanks to the type of collaborative effort that is more and more the norm in these connected times. Yes, the research was brilliant, and if we're lucky, it will produce innovations in biology, medicine, biotechnology and agriculture. It could save lives, and it happened because this scientist talked with that one, that one knew another one, and brilliant minds overcame geographic distance to advance human understanding.

16 Sep 2014

GHIT Fund announces new grants to tackle malaria, chagas disease and dengue

The Global Health Innovative Technology Fund, a new public health partnership that is bringing Japanese know-how and investment to the global fight against infectious diseases, today announced seven grant investments totaling US$15.3 million to speed the development of promising drugs and vaccines to battle three insect-borne diseases-malaria, dengue and Chagas disease.

16 Sep 2014

Massive global response needed to prevent Ebola infection, say experts

The current Ebola outbreak now requires a "rapid response at a massive global scale", according to experts at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.

15 Sep 2014

Getting flu shot every autumn can lead to better health

Everyone knows that the best way to avoid the flu is by getting an annual flu shot. But a trip to your physician every autumn for the vaccination can help you avoid much more than the dreaded flu bug. "At the doctor's office, the focus is on you and what is going on with your health. This is your time to talk about concerns to improve your well-being beyond the flu season," says Jorge Parada, MD, MPH, the medical director of the Infection Prevention and Control Program at Loyola University Health System.

15 Sep 2014

Research roundup: Prevention services for seniors; drug shortages

This policy brief reports the findings of a systematic review conducted by the Community Health Innovations in Prevention for Seniors (CHIPS) project. ... Clinical preventive services such as colorectal cancer screening and pneumococcal immunization can help reduce rates of premature death and disability. Yet, many older adults are not receiving the full set of clinical preventive services that have been proven effective and are considered "high value" in terms of their costs per life saved. Rates are particularly low among racial and ethnic minority older adults compared to national goals.

15 Sep 2014

NSF, NIH, USDA receive more than $12 million in new EEID grants

Ebola, MERS (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome), malaria, antibiotic-resistant infections: Is our interaction with the environment somehow responsible for their increased incidence?

11 Sep 2014

Measles infections worse than flu, new study reveals

Measles causes significant absence from school or work and has a much larger impact on people’s daily lives than illnesses like flu or chicken pox, according to a new study by researchers from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and Public Health England.

11 Sep 2014

Widespread use of unnecessary antibiotics drives up avoidable healthcare costs

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Premier, Inc. have released new research on the widespread use of unnecessary and duplicative antibiotics in U.S. hospitals, which could have led to an estimated $163 million in excess costs.

11 Sep 2014

Scientists crack genetic code of liver fluke parasite

Singapore-An international team of scientists from Singapore, Thailand, China and Australia has cracked the genetic code of the liver fluke parasite, Opisthorchis viverrini, using a unique DNA analysis technique developed at A*STAR's Genome Institute of Singapore (GIS).

11 Sep 2014

Fogarty receives three grants for research focused on biodiversity conservation

In addition to diseases for which there are ineffective or no cures, key pathogens are becoming increasingly drug-resistant.

10 Sep 2014

Improper removal of personal protective gear increases risk for Ebola health care workers

A team of American infectious disease and critical care experts is alerting colleagues caring for Ebola patients that how they remove their personal protective gear can be just as crucial as wearing it to prevent exposure to the deadly virus.

10 Sep 2014

New public resource to help researchers explore country-specific requirements

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) today launched ClinRegs, an online public database of country-specific clinical research regulatory information.

10 Sep 2014

American men have worse access to reproductive and sexual health care, shows research

Compared with women, American men have worse access to reproductive and sexual health care, research shows, a disparity fueled in part by the lack of standard clinical guidelines on the types and timing of exams, tests and treatments that should be offered to all men of reproductive age.

10 Sep 2014

Researchers explain why people with asthma have hard time dealing with respiratory viruses

People with asthma often have a hard time dealing with respiratory viruses such as the flu or the common cold, and researchers have struggled to explain why.

10 Sep 2014

Unusual kind of immune cell in tongue appears to play pivotal role in prevention of thrush

An unusual kind of immune cell in the tongue appears to play a pivotal role in the prevention of thrush, according to the researchers at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine who discovered them.

9 Sep 2014

National health research forum

Leaders from government, industry, academia and patient advocacy organizations will explore the future of R&D investments, policy trends, public-private partnerships, public health and social sciences research, global health threats and other timely medical and health research issues in panel discussions hosted by Research!America.

9 Sep 2014

Researchers aim to safely and quickly suppress food allergies in human

In mice, the answer appears to be "yes," but making sure the same can happen in humans is a task that Fred Finkelman, MD, professor of medicine and pediatrics in the University of Cincinnati's (UC) College of Medicine and a researcher at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, is attempting to tackle.

9 Sep 2014

SLU researchers work to prevent several serious infectious diseases

Saint Louis University researchers are attacking influenza on multiple fronts as they search for a universal vaccine that protects people from the flu virus that often mutates year to year with deadly consequences.

9 Sep 2014

Experimental vaccine protects monkeys exposed to Ebola virus

One shot of an experimental vaccine made from two Ebola virus gene segments incorporated into a chimpanzee cold virus vector (called chimp adenovirus type 3 or ChAd3) protected all four macaque monkeys exposed to high levels of Ebola virus 5 weeks after inoculation, report National Institutes of Health (NIH) scientists and their collaborators.

9 Sep 2014