Disease/Infection News

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Reuters reports on PLoS medicine series on water, sanitation

Nearly 20 percent of the world's population still defecates in the open, and action to improve hygiene, sanitation and water supply could prevent more than 2 million child deaths a year, health experts said" on Monday, following the release of a series of papers on water and sanitation published in the journal PLoS Medicine, Reuters reports.

16 Nov 2010

New mathematical method predicts dominant strain of influenza virus

Rice University scientists have found a way to predict rapidly whether a new strain of the influenza virus should be included in the annual seasonal flu vaccine. While it sometimes takes new flu strains up to three years to become dominant worldwide, the new method can predict whether they will become dominant as little as two weeks after the sequence first appears in the GenBank database, the National Institutes of Health's collection of all publicly available DNA sequences.

16 Nov 2010

National campaign to highlight significance of antibiotic resistance

Antibiotic resistance is one of the world's most pressing public health threats. To bring attention to this increasing problem, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other government partners will observe its third annual Get Smart About Antibiotics Week on Nov. 15-21, 2010.

16 Nov 2010

Researchers develop new vaccine delivery system for rotavirus infection

Researchers have developed a promising new approach to vaccination for rotavirus, a common cause of severe diarrheal disease that is responsible for approximately 500,000 deaths among children in the developing world every year.

16 Nov 2010

Sen. Lugar highlights potential bioterrorism threat posed by unsecured medical facilities in East Africa

Senator Dick Lugar on Friday said that poorly secured medical laboratories in East African countries, which host insurgent groups linked to Al Qaeda, are vulnerable to bioterrorism, Agence France-Presse reports.

16 Nov 2010

New i-phone application provides instant access to HIV drug interactions

The University of Liverpool has launched an i-phone application, HIV iChart,that provides healthcare professionals and HIV patients with instant and easy access to information about drug interactions.

16 Nov 2010

NPR reports on dengue vaccine progress

NPR's Shots blog examines progress in the search for a vaccine to protect against the dengue virus. WHO estimates that 2.5 billion people worldwide are at risk of getting dengue, and most of them are in Asia and Latin America, the blog writes.

16 Nov 2010

Teva presents QNAZE Phase III study results for SAR at ACAAI Meeting

Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. today announced results from a Phase III study of QNAZE (beclomethasone dipropionate [BDP]) HFA, a nasal aerosol corticosteroid in development for the treatment of seasonal allergic rhinitis (SAR), that demonstrated significantly greater symptom relief compared with placebo.

15 Nov 2010

Cholera deaths in Haiti top 900; U.N. appeals for $164m to deal with outbreak that could affect 200,000

Haiti's Health Ministry on Sunday said 917 cholera deaths had been reported in the country as of Friday and more than 14,600 people had been hospitalized, according to an update on the ministry's website, Reuters reports.

15 Nov 2010

NanoViricides' optimized FluCide drug candidates reduce viral load in H1N1 influenza virus study

NanoViricides, Inc. reports that its optimized FluCide™ drug candidates achieved dramatic reduction in viral load within the lungs of animals infected with a lethal dose of H1N1 influenza virus.

15 Nov 2010

Temple University professionals focus on community viral load to combat HIV

World AIDS Day is December 1, but healthcare professionals at Temple University work year-round to combat HIV by focusing on reducing the community viral load, or the severity of HIV in a particular group. This approach has become widespread in the past two years, and it is still evolving and undergoing evaluation.

15 Nov 2010

Prolonged use of cell phone increases nickel allergy

Chatting endlessly on your cell phone can lead to an allergic reaction to the nickel in your phone, according to allergists at the annual meeting of the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (ACAAI) in Phoenix, Nov. 11-16. From cosmetics to jewelry, body piercings to tattoos, allergies can lurk in unlikely places, allergists say.

15 Nov 2010

Inovio third quarter total revenue decreases from $3.6 million to $1.3 million

Inovio Pharmaceuticals, Inc. today reported financial results for the quarter ended September 30, 2010.

15 Nov 2010

Researchers find influenza vaccines can contain allergenic components

People with egg or gelatin allergies shouldn't assume that just because they've had a flu shot safely in the past they will be able to again, according to a new study, presented at the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology annual meeting in Phoenix Nov. 11-16.

15 Nov 2010

Novel light technology kills hospital superbugs

A pioneering lighting system that can kill hospital superbugs - including MRSA and C.diff - has been developed by researchers at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow. Scotland.

15 Nov 2010

WHO endorses low tech, low cost, rapid test for multi-drug resistant TB

A rapid, low cost test for diagnosing tuberculosis (TB) - including multi-drug resistance - has been endorsed by the World Health Organisation (WHO) for use in resource-poor settings.

15 Nov 2010

Deinobiotics project receives €1.35 million for developing novel antibiotic, antifungal compounds

Deinove, the world's leading specialist in Deinococcus bacteria for biofuels, green chemistry and antibiotics, today announced that its Deinobiotics project is to receive a total of €1.35 million in grants and loans.

15 Nov 2010

Report documents increase in R&D projects on developing world diseases

Drugmakers are now working on over 100 R&D projects designed to tackle diseases of the developing world and almost 80% of them are being carried out with non-industry partners, according to a report released on Wednesday by the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers & Associations (IFPMA).

15 Nov 2010

New findings on HIV can help validate structure-based drug design approach

The development of new drugs to treat and prevent HIV/AIDS depends on understanding the basic biology of how the virus infects human cells. For 25 years, researchers supported primarily by NIH's National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) have been generating the structures of key viral proteins, revealing important insights into the virus's mechanisms and, more importantly, its Achilles' heels.

15 Nov 2010

Research on E.Coli bacteria could help develop new vaccine for urinary tract infection

Urinary tract infections are a painful, recurring problem for millions of women. They are also getting more dangerous as bacteria develop resistance to the most common treatments.

15 Nov 2010