Category Archives: pandemic

Measles kills more than 300 in DR Congo | News | DW.COM | 14.08.2015

The outbreak of measles in the copper-mining Katanga province in the Democratic Republic of Congo is the worst since 2011, according to the humanitarian organization Doctors without Borders (MSF, Medecins Sans Frontiers), which conducts vaccination campaigns in remote areas.

“Almost 320 people died,” the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in a statement. “Dozens of others may have succumbed to the illness but they don’t figure in official records,” the statement added.

The measles epidemic in the province of Katanga “is only worsening and gaining ground”, the UN warned.

via Measles kills more than 300 in DR Congo | News | DW.COM | 14.08.2015.

VDU’s blog: post-Ebola syndrome or just chronic Ebola virus disease…?

There are at least 13,000 people in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone who have survived an encounter with the Makona variant of Zaire ebolavirus (EBOV) since December 2013.1

But that’s not where the story, or the suffering, ends for these people.

Following the resolution of acute Ebola virus disease (EVD), there is the spectre of a lengthy period of subsequent symptoms, sometimes called ‘post-Ebola syndrome’ (I’d prefer post-Ebola virus disease syndrome or PEVDS), which is similar to that found among survivors from past outbreaks.2,3

via VDU’s blog: post-Ebola syndrome or just chronic Ebola virus disease…?.

Study: Mowing dry basins can boost mosquito activity, West Nile risk

A recent University of Illinois study on the risk of West Nile virus with “dry” water-detention basins in Central Illinois indicated that mowing these dry basins worsens mosquito problems.

The researchers said mowing wetland plants inside basins that have not properly drained can cause a rapid increase in Culex pipiens mosquito populations, which can carry and transmit West Nile virus.

“We suspect bacteria quickly colonize the waterborne debris, and mosquito larvae feed on the bacteria,” Brian Allan, a University of Illinois entomology professor and co-author of the study, said.

“After aquatic plants were mowed in the basins, we saw a large increase in the number of Culex pipiens mosquito larvae in the basins, which had relatively few before mowing,” postdoctoral researcher Andrew Mackay, another author of the study, said. “And perhaps more importantly, we caught about twice as many adult Culex mosquitoes in traps at basins after these plants were mowed, compared with basins where the aquatic vegetation was left intact.

“We had observed that these phragmites-invaded basins would become colonized by large communal roosts of birds, and we thought that was important because birds are the natural reservoir hosts of West Nile virus,” Mackay said.

“Instead, we found that the presence of a communal bird roost actually decreased West Nile virus risk,” Allan said. “That may be because these wetland roosts include a variety of bird species, many of which are not good reservoirs of the virus. They don’t amplify the virus like other bird species more associated with residential areas do — the American robin, for example.

“We measured mosquito abundance, and we measured West Nile virus prevalence in the mosquitoes we collected in this field study, and we were able to show that it’s these mowed areas where you actually get the highest West Nile virus risk to people in the surrounding landscape,” Allan said.

via Study: Mowing dry basins can boost mosquito activity, West Nile risk.

Smoke Goes Around the World : Image of the Day

{Ten extra points if you can guess what happens to a variety of air pollutants – grin} “Summertime wildfires in Alaska and Canada occur every year, with some inter-annual variations,” said Hiren Jethva, an atmospheric scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. But the distance traveled by the smoke varies greatly. Aerosol concentration and height, as well as wind patterns and speed, are just some of the factors that determine the course of a plume’s atmospheric journey.

Jethva and colleagues first used the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) on NASA’s Aura satellite to observe the long-range transport of the July 2015 plumes. Jethva noted that the plumes were often located over lower-level clouds for much of the period shown above. Researchers have found that when aerosols are located over clouds, or any other bright surface, they can impart a net warming effect on the climate. That, in turn, can affect the stability of the atmosphere and the lifetime of clouds.

via Smoke Goes Around the World : Image of the Day.

Bird Flu Cost the US $3.3 Billion and Worse Could Be Coming – Phenomena: Germination

As I reported earlier, animal-health authorities suspected—and virus analysis is now confirming—that while the flu was originally brought to the US by wild birds migrating down from Canada, most of the spread within the US was due to people and vehicles inadvertently carrying the virus from farm to farm.

via Bird Flu Cost the US $3.3 Billion and Worse Could Be Coming – Phenomena: Germination.

“Maryn is an excellent reporter and researcher. I think she will find or has already found and will report soon that if some wild birds were involved in the transmission of avian influenza, they most likely acquired it from domestic industrial flocks in China, Korea. Wherever industrial poultry is practised across the globe, this flu is developing, mutating in the industrial settings and being transmitted more by commerce, than migrating birds that come in contact with infected industrial birds.”

Latin America Has Beaten Down, but not Beaten, HIV/AIDS | Inter Press Service

As an example to be followed, the report cites a major regional accomplishment: on Jun. 30 Cuba became the first country in the world to receive validation from the World Health Organisation (WHO) that it had eliminated mother-to-child transmission of HIV/AIDS.

Chile, Costa Rica and Uruguay are set to become the next countries in the region to receive validation, possibly before June 2016, the regional director of UNAIDS for Latin America, César Núñez, said in an interview with IPS from Panama City.

via Latin America Has Beaten Down, but not Beaten, HIV/AIDS | Inter Press Service.

Tularemia warning issued in New Mexico

The New Mexico Department of Health issued a warning Monday about the risk of contracting tularemia.

The warning was issued after a 51-year-old Los Alamos Countyman received laboratory confirmation from the Scientific Laboratory Division of the Health Department that he has tularemia. He returned home after receiving hospitalization.

Health professionals also have reported 33 tularemia cases in pet cats and dogs so far this year. The pets were located throughout Santa Fe, Torrance, Taos, Los Alamos and Bernalillo

via Tularemia warning issued in New Mexico.