Disease/Infection News

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Clinical trial to test whether fecal transplantation is effective in treating relapsing C. difficile

For patients with Clostridium difficile (C. difficile), a persistent and potentially deadly bacterial illness, severe diarrhea, abdominal pain, nausea and vomiting are an everyday event. This particularly virulent infection is prone to recurrence, even after multiple courses of expensive antibiotics, and treatment options are limited for patients who continually relapse or develop antibiotic resistance.

22 Aug 2012

Chimpanzees from African sanctuaries carry drug-resistant strains of Staph

Chimpanzees from African sanctuaries carry drug-resistant, human-associated strains of the bacteria Staphlyococcus aureus, a pathogen that the infected chimpanzees could spread to endangered wild ape populations if they were reintroduced to their natural habitat, a new study shows.

22 Aug 2012

Viewpoints: The importance of hepatitis C testing; Medicaid needs to provide coverage for circumcision

I consider myself to be a fortunate person. I have a good education, a great job and excellent health insurance. I am a baby boomer who has aged reasonably well and can look forward to a fairly comfortable retirement. I am also fortunate because I was diagnosed with hepatitis C by a proactive and knowledgeable doctor in the late 1990s and had the opportunity to be treated and cured. The odds are that if I had not been diagnosed and treated, I would be on a liver transplant list right now, have liver cancer or even be dead from this disease.

22 Aug 2012

Massachusetts Institute of Technology to honor IHME's health measurement expert

For the first time, a prestigious technical innovation honor from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) will go to an expert in health measurement: Abraham Flaxman, an Assistant Professor of Global Health at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington (UW).

22 Aug 2012

NIAID announces 14 grants for basic research to identify new HIV vaccine approaches

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, has awarded 14 grants totaling $7.8 million in first-year funding for basic research to identify new approaches for designing a safe and effective HIV vaccine.

22 Aug 2012

Declining circumcision rates in the US raise healthcare costs and disease risk

A team of disease experts and health economists at Johns Hopkins warns that steadily declining rates of U.S. infant male circumcision could add more than $4.4 billion in avoidable health care costs if rates over the next decade drop to levels now seen in Europe.

21 Aug 2012

Women in developing countries could play a major role in remedying sanitation and water crisis

People in ancient Rome 2,000 years ago had better access to clean water and sanitation that keeps disease-causing human excrement out of contact with people than many residents of the 21st century, a scientist said here today.

21 Aug 2012

DR Congo reports Ebola outbreak near Uganda border

"Nine people have died in an outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Health Minister Felix Kabangue said on Saturday," Agence France-Presse reports.

21 Aug 2012

WHO calls for emergency stockpile of cholera vaccine

The World Health Organization (WHO) is calling for the establishment of a global stockpile of the cholera vaccine to respond to outbreaks like the one that has gripped Haiti since an earthquake hit the country in 2010, NPR's "Shots" reports.

21 Aug 2012

International community observes World Humanitarian Day

On World Humanitarian Day, recognized August 19, "United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has highlighted the power of individual actions to spark global changes, and praised the work of humanitarian workers who provide assistance to vulnerable people around the world," the U.N. News Centre reports.

21 Aug 2012

World Mosquito Day marks 114 years of battle against malaria

"Each year on August 20, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) celebrates World Mosquito Day to honor the date in 1897 when British doctor Ronald Ross discovered that female mosquitoes transmit malaria between human beings," AlertNet reports.

21 Aug 2012

Sierra Leone declares cholera outbreak a national emergency

"Sierra Leone has declared a cholera outbreak that has left 176 people dead since the start of the year a national humanitarian emergency, officials said Friday," AlertNet reports, adding, "Jonathan Abass Kamara, public relations officer for Sierra Leone's health ministry, said the outbreak was the worst in the West Africa country's history."

21 Aug 2012

Mali faces 'complex humanitarian emergency' as a result of displacement, food insecurity

"More than 435,000 people have been displaced in Mali, as the country faces a complex humanitarian emergency due to conflict and food insecurity, according to a new report released by the United Nations relief agency," the U.N. News Centre reports.

21 Aug 2012

New statistical model predicts global decline in working-age adults to support elderly people

A new statistical model predicts that by 2100 the number of people older than 85 worldwide will increase more than previously estimated, and there will be fewer working-age adults to support them than previously expected.

21 Aug 2012

Daily vitamin D intake protects against respiratory infections in children

A study conducted in Mongolian schoolchildren supports the possibility that daily vitamin D supplementation can reduce the risk of respiratory infections in winter. In a report that will appear in the journal Pediatrics and has received early online release, an international research team found that vitamin D supplementation decreased the risk of respiratory infections among children who had low blood levels of vitamin D at the start of the study.

21 Aug 2012

Researchers reveal possible drug targets to combat anthrax

A trawl of the genome of the deadly bacterium Bacillus anthracis has revealed a clutch of targets for new drugs to combat an epidemic of anthrax or a biological weapons attack.

21 Aug 2012

HIV home test popular among men with high risk sexual practices

Thirty years into the HIV epidemic, many people who are at high risk of HIV infection cannot or will not adopt safer sexual practices, such as abstinence and condom use. This means there is room in the market for alternative methods to reduce either exposure to or transmission of HIV among these individuals.

21 Aug 2012

Injectable controlled-release capsules against gum disease

Scientists are trying to open a new front in the battle against gum disease, the leading cause of tooth loss in adults and sometimes termed the most serious oral health problem of the 21st century. They described another treatment approach for the condition in a report here today at the 244th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society, the world's largest scientific society.

20 Aug 2012

Infectious disease rates are high among homeless people

Rates of the infectious diseases HIV, Hepatitis C and tuberculosis among the world’s homeless people are many times higher than in the general population, according to a new systematic review of existing data published Online First in The Lancet Infectious Diseases.

20 Aug 2012

Paper-strip test could identify counterfeit versions of faked medicines in the world

In a thrust against the major problem of counterfeit medicines sold in developing countries, which causes thousands of illnesses and deaths annually, scientists today described development of a simple, paper-strip test that people could use to identify counterfeit versions of one of the most-frequently faked medicines in the world.

20 Aug 2012