Tularemia is a disease of animals and humans caused by the bacterium Francisella tularensis. Rabbits, hares, and rodents are especially susceptible and often die in large numbers during outbreaks. Humans can become infected through several routes, including tick and deer fly bites, skin contact with infected animals, ingestion of contaminated water, or inhalation of contaminated dusts or aerosols. In addition, humans could be exposed as a result of bioterrorism. Symptoms vary depending upon the route of infection. Although tularemia can be life-threatening, most infections can be treated successfully with antibiotics. Steps to prevent tularemia include use of insect repellent, wearing gloves when handling sick or dead animals, and not mowing over dead animals. In the United States, naturally occurring infections have been reported from all States except Hawaii.
Developing and testing new treatments or vaccines for humans almost always requires animal trials, but these experiments can sometimes take years to complete and can raise ethical concerns about the animals' treatment.
In a recent study published in the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases, researchers analyzed ticks that bit humans between January 2014 and March 2021 in France for the presence of bacterial pathogens.
People afflicted with autoimmune diseases may someday receive help through treatments now under development by a Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory licensee and its' collaborations with two major pharmaceutical companies.
A three-dose regimen of a whole-parasite vaccine against malaria – called Plasmodium falciparum sporozoite (PfSPZ) vaccine – demonstrated safety and efficacy when tested in adults living in Burkina Faso, West Africa, which has endemic malaria.
Anyone who enjoys taking walks through the woods or grassy fields when the weather is warm knows that checking for ticks afterward is a must.
Prescribed fire -; a tool increasingly used by forest managers and landowners to combat invasive species, improve wildlife habitat and restore ecosystem health -; also could play a role in reducing the abundance of ticks and the transmission of disease pathogens they carry, according to a team of scientists.
Researchers from the Zoonosis Science Center at Uppsala University have identified a new coronavirus. Their study of approximately 260 bank voles caught around Grimsö, örebro County, shows that the virus is well established in Sweden's red-backed voles. The finding has been published in the journal Viruses.
Tularemia is a rare but often lethal disease. It is caused by one of the most aggressive pathogens on earth, the bacterium Francisella tularensis.
Diarrheal diseases are a leading cause of death for young children, accounting for nine percent of all deaths worldwide in children under five years of age, with most occurring in children under two years of age.
Each year, millions of people contract serious diarrheal illnesses typically from contaminated food and water. Among the biggest causes of diarrheal diseases are the bacteria Shigella and enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli, and researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine are testing a vaccine designed to offer protection against these serious pathogens.
Stockholm University researchers have found that the impact of climate change of disease incidence of tularemia could be statistically predicted. In high-latitude regions, where the disease was less common, global warming could lead to increasing number of cases of the disease they wrote.
In biotech these days, CRISPR/Cas9 is a hot topic, because of its utility as a precise gene editing tool. Before humans repurposed it, CRISPR/Cas9 was a sort of internal immune system bacteria use to defend themselves against phages, or viruses that infect bacteria, by slicing up the phages' DNA.
A new study has been launched in Burkina Faso for Bharat Biotech's typhoid conjugate vaccine. It is the second clinical study underway in Africa for the vaccine and the first in West Africa.
In Germany, 41 cases of tularemia were reported in 2016. The infections are mainly due to direct contact with infected animals or with insect vectors like ticks and mosquitos.
National Institutes of Health researchers have identified a naturally occurring lipid--a waxy, fatty acid--used by a disease-causing bacterium to impair the host immune response and increase the chance of infection. Inadvertently, they also may have found a potent inflammation therapy against bacterial and viral diseases.
Scientists from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases--part of the National Institutes of Health--have unraveled the process by which the bacteria cause disease.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has released a new report warning people about the myriad of diseases that are transmitted via bites of blood-sucking insects such as ticks, mosquitoes and fleas calling it a “growing health problem” in the United States.
Today the University of Maryland School of Medicine's Center for Vaccine Development is proud to be part of vaccine history in Africa.
Tularemia is an infectious bacterial disease that is life-threatening for rodents, rabbits and hares, but which can also infect humans and dogs.
During World War II, the Soviet Red Army was forced to move their biological warfare operations out of the path of advancing Nazi troops. Among the dangerous cargo were vials of Francisella tularensis, the organism that causes tularemia and one of the world's most infectious pathogens.