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Government mistrust and conspiracy fears deter older adults from getting tested for HIV

One out of every four people living with HIV/AIDS is 50 or older, yet these older individuals are far more likely to be diagnosed when they are already in the later stages of infection. Such late diagnoses put their health, and the health of others, at greater risk than would have been the case with earlier detection.

31 Jan 2013

Gunmen in Pakistan kill police officer escorting polio vaccination workers

In the latest round of violence affecting health workers in Pakistan, "gunmen riding on a motorcycle shot and killed a police officer protecting polio workers during a U.N.-backed vaccination campaign in northwestern Pakistan on Tuesday, the police said," the Associated Press reports.

31 Jan 2013

International community must continue to fund efforts to stop spread of infectious diseases

Writing in the Huffington Post's "The Big Push" blog, Dirk Niebel, Germany's federal minister of economic cooperation and development, discusses "why Germany announced last week that it is committing one billion euros over five years to the Global Fund."

31 Jan 2013

Researchers identify mechanism by which vancomycin resistance spreads between bacteria

Worldwide, many strains of the bacterium Staphyloccocus aureus, commonly known as staph infections, are already resistant to all antibiotics except vancomycin. But as bacteria are becoming resistant to this once powerful antidote, S. aureus has moved one step closer to becoming an unstoppable killer.

31 Jan 2013

Potty training right from the birth can eliminate need for diapers

Western babies are potty trained later these days and need diapers until an average of three years of age. But even infants can be potty trained. A study by researchers at Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, Sweden, followed 47 infants and their mothers in Vietnam - where potty training starts at birth and the need for diapers is usually eliminated by nine months of age.

31 Jan 2013

Top ten tips for keeping bed bugs at bay

Bed bugs are on the rise and $1,000 per day ordinances are being suggested in cities like Chicago to enforce combat of the pests. "Know thy enemy," says Jorge Parada, MD, medical director, infection control, Loyola University Health System. "There are lots of myths out there about bed bugs and people may be getting caught up over nothing."

30 Jan 2013

Vaccine confidence: an interview with Dr Heidi Larson

Here at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine we are running a project called the Vaccine Confidence Project and we have a global surveillance monitoring information around the world on media, social media, all sorts of information, reports from governments, UN, other sources, looking for any what we call “signals” of public distrust or concerns that come up.

30 Jan 2013

Scientists study waves of influenza and climate patterns in the U.S. from 1997-1998

The American public can expect to add earlier and more severe flu seasons to the fallout from climate change, according to a research study published online Jan. 28 in PLOS Currents: Influenza.

30 Jan 2013

Dilaforette receives approval to initiate sevuparin Phase II malaria study in India

Dilaforette, a Karolinska Development portfolio company, today announces that the company has approval from the regulatory authority in India to start a Phase II study with sevuparin in patients with moderate to severe malaria.

30 Jan 2013

HIV/AIDS Legal Assessment Tool aims to tackle HIV-related discrimination

Writing in the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's "Impatient Optimists" blog, Jennifer James, founder of Mom Bloggers for Social Good, examines the HIV/AIDS Legal Assessment Tool created by the American Bar Association Rule of Law Initiative.

30 Jan 2013

Research to encourage more effective and efficient management of water resources

Born and raised in a rural village in Northern Ghana, Dr. Braimah Apambire knows the value of resources in a critically deprived country.

30 Jan 2013

Blog examines next steps should a therapeutic AIDS vaccine be developed

In a post in the "Tomorrow Global" blog, Danielle Parsons, an HIV/AIDS specialist, highlights a number of advances made in the search for an AIDS vaccine, writing, "All of this work is promising, and it's starting to feel like we're back on track for a successful therapeutic vaccine in the next decade."

30 Jan 2013

New clue to why some people fight infections better than others

As influenza spreads through the northern hemisphere winter, Dr Linda Wakim and her colleagues in the Laboratory of Professor Jose Villadangos from the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, and the Department of Microbiology and Immunology, believe they have a new clue to why some people fight infections better than others.

30 Jan 2013

U.S. Supreme Court should end 'counterproductive' federal anti-prostitution pledge

In the Huffington Post's "Politics" blog, journalist and author John-Manuel Andriote notes the U.S. Supreme Court this month agreed to hear a case challenging the federal anti-prostitution pledge, which requires groups that receive federal funding for overseas HIV/AIDS programs to sign a pledge denouncing prostitution and sex trafficking as a condition for receiving funding, and describes the history of the policy.

30 Jan 2013

HIV-positive patients have higher incidence of non-melanoma skin cancers

HIV-positive patients have a higher incidence of non-melanoma skin cancers, according to a Kaiser Permanente study that appears in the current online issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Specifically, basal cell and squamous cell carcinomas occur more than twice as often among HIV-positive individuals compared to those who are HIV-negative.

30 Jan 2013

Low-income and minority parents/guardians receptive toward vaccinating boys against HPV

A new Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) study has found that low-income and minority parents/guardians were receptive toward vaccinating boys against Human Papilloma Virus (HPV). However, racial/ethnic differences emerged in attitudes regarding school-entry mandates. The findings appear online in the journal Clinical Pediatrics.

30 Jan 2013

Cambodian health officials strengthen avian flu awareness campaigns after 2 more deaths

"Two more children have died in Cambodia of bird flu, bringing the number of fatal cases this year to four and the number of cases overall to five," the Associated Press/Wall Street Journal reports, noting only three cases were reported in all of 2012. "WHO says bird flu, also known as avian influenza, or H5N1, has killed 360 other people worldwide since surfacing in 2003," with most cases "linked to contact with infected poultry," the news agency writes.

30 Jan 2013

Researchers identify mechanism by which S. aureus colonises nasal passages

A collaboration between researchers at the School of Biochemistry and Immunology and the Department of Microbiology at Trinity College Dublin has identified a mechanism by which the bacterium Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) colonises our nasal passages.

29 Jan 2013

Have scientists thoroughly addressed avian flu research concerns?

Noting that a nearly yearlong moratorium on H5N1 avian influenza research, put in place "because of safety and terrorism concerns," was lifted recently, a New York Times editorial states, "We wish we could be as sanguine as they are that all the earlier concerns have been dealt with."

29 Jan 2013

Polio eradication must fit into larger public health, development goals

"The tragic murders of nine anti-polio workers in Pakistan last month, followed by the New Year's Day killing of seven more local community development workers, was both a wake-up call to the global polio eradication effort in its current form, and a 'canary in the mine' regarding the deteriorating state of development and security in the country," Heidi Larson, a senior lecturer and principal investigator at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, writes in a SciDev.Net opinion piece.

29 Jan 2013

Disease/Infection News

Government mistrust and conspiracy fears deter older adults from getting tested for HIV

Gunmen in Pakistan kill police officer escorting polio vaccination workers

International community must continue to fund efforts to stop spread of infectious diseases

Researchers identify mechanism by which vancomycin resistance spreads between bacteria

Potty training right from the birth can eliminate need for diapers

Top ten tips for keeping bed bugs at bay

Vaccine confidence: an interview with Dr Heidi Larson

Scientists study waves of influenza and climate patterns in the U.S. from 1997-1998

Dilaforette receives approval to initiate sevuparin Phase II malaria study in India

HIV/AIDS Legal Assessment Tool aims to tackle HIV-related discrimination

Research to encourage more effective and efficient management of water resources

Blog examines next steps should a therapeutic AIDS vaccine be developed

New clue to why some people fight infections better than others

U.S. Supreme Court should end 'counterproductive' federal anti-prostitution pledge

HIV-positive patients have higher incidence of non-melanoma skin cancers

Low-income and minority parents/guardians receptive toward vaccinating boys against HPV

Cambodian health officials strengthen avian flu awareness campaigns after 2 more deaths

Researchers identify mechanism by which S. aureus colonises nasal passages

Have scientists thoroughly addressed avian flu research concerns?

Polio eradication must fit into larger public health, development goals

How can microdialysis benefit drug development

Global and Local Efforts to Take Action Against Hepatitis

Addressing Important Cardiac Biology Questions with Shotgun Top-Down Proteomics

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