Disease/Infection News

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AIDS Healthcare Foundation's innovative "Stay Negative" campaign successfully breaks through to target audience

A post-campaign survey of AIDS Healthcare Foundation's (AHF) innovative "Stay Negative" social marketing campaign recently revealed the initiative's success at breaking through to its target audience and reaching its objective to create an effective health education and risk reduction campaign to raise awareness among gay males in Los Angeles County that HIV infection is still a serious threat.

4 Oct 2007

Bird flu on Saskatchewan farm results in culling of 50,000 chickens

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) says chickens infected with a highly pathogenic H7N3 strain of avian influenza on a farm in Saskatchewan have all been destroyed.

4 Oct 2007

Choosing the best treatment for disease

The diagnosis has come in, and it's not good. Worse, the patient has to choose from treatment options that are sometimes contradictory and risky.

4 Oct 2007

Learning from the Toronto SARS outbreak

Locked doors, full masks and gowns, questionnaires and line-ups at the hand washing stations - getting health-care services during SARS wasn't easy.

4 Oct 2007

Potential new drugs for tropical disease leishmaniasis

The fight against the deadly tropical disease Leishmaniasis, also known as black fever, has been boosted by scientists at the University of Durham, whose new screening system has raised the possibility of new, safer drugs.

3 Oct 2007

Mozambique Archbishop Chimoio's comments claiming European-made condoms, antiretrovirals deliberately tainted with HIV, baseless

Comments made last week by Archbishop Francisco Chimoio, head of the Roman Catholic Church in Mozambique, that two European countries make condoms deliberately tainted with HIV as part of a plan "to finish quickly the African people" are "lunatic theories" and "baseless allegations," a Los Angeles Times editorial says (Los Angeles Times, 9/29).

2 Oct 2007

Irish Government launches program to provide life insurance to people with HIV, Hep C through contaminated blood products

The Irish government on Thursday launched a program to provide life insurance, mortgage protection and travel insurance to people who contracted HIV or hepatitis C through contaminated blood products, Ireland's Evening Echo reports (Evening Echo, 9/27).

2 Oct 2007

Judge acquits Canadian doctors, U.S. drug company in tainted blood case

A Canadian judge on Monday acquitted New Jersey-based Armour Pharmaceutical Company and four Canadian doctors -- including the former medical director of the Canadian Red Cross and two government officials -- of charges related to blood products contaminated with HIV and hepatitis C, the New York Times reports (Austen, New York Times, 10/2).

2 Oct 2007

Washington, D.C., community groups return 70,000 condoms given away in program to reduce STIs

Community groups in Washington, D.C., last week returned up to 70,000 of the condoms given away earlier this year as part of a city program that aims to reduce the spread of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections, the AP/Google.com reports.

2 Oct 2007

Officials say, although China has low HIV prevalence, situation serious in some provinces affected by drug trafficking, illegal blood donations

While the HIV prevalence in China remains low, the situation in several provinces affected by drug trafficking and illegal blood donations is serious, senior HIV/AIDS control officials said on Saturday, Xinhua/China Daily reports.

2 Oct 2007

Prisons in Maryland have highest percentage of AIDS cases nationwide

Prisons in Maryland have the highest percentage of inmates living with AIDS nationwide, according to a study by the Department of Justice, the Baltimore Sun reports. The study is based on statistics from 41 states at the end of 2005.

2 Oct 2007

Breast health and cancer prevention tips for women and men

In addition to the bright reds, oranges and yellows seen as the leaves turn this fall, pink will be everywhere during October, which is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

2 Oct 2007

Rubella elimination advancing in the Americas

The First Lady of the Dominican Republic, Dr. Margarita Cedeno de Fernandez, today urged the countries of the Americas to redouble their efforts to eliminate rubella and congenital rubella syndrome as well as all other vaccine-preventable diseases.

2 Oct 2007

Winning the battle against deadly Ebola

The latest reports from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) say health workers are slowly winning the battle against the deadly Ebola hemorrhagic fever.

2 Oct 2007

Another bird flu victim in Indonesia takes the death toll to 86

Though experts are investigating how the man contracted the virus, it is unclear how he could have come into contact with sick poultry as keeping backyard poultry has been banned by the Jakarta government since February.

2 Oct 2007

Million of pounds of frozen ground beef contaminated with E.coli

The latest recall of food products in the United States has left consumers alarmed and also at a loss when it comes to the safety and reliability of many foods offered for sale in stores.

2 Oct 2007

New way to fight hepatitis B

One in four people who are chronically infected with hepatitis B will die from its impact if untreated, but a team of researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine has identified the most cost-effective way of fighting this treacherous infection.

2 Oct 2007

Factor MIF a potential target for West Nile virus

Infection with West Nile Virus (WNV) can cause lethal encephalitis and there are currently no vaccines or specific therapeutics for use in humans.

2 Oct 2007

Majority of Europeans with hepatitis C remain undiagnosed

A report by the Eurasian Harm Reduction Network (EHRN highlights the significant inconsistencies that exist in hepatitis C (HCV) diagnosis and treatment across Europe and beyond. In recognition of World Hepatitis Awareness Day, patient groups around the globe are united in their call for action.

1 Oct 2007

H5N1 able to pass through placenta to fetus and infect organs other than lungs in adults

The H5N1 strain of the bird flu virus can pass through the placenta of pregnant women to the unborn fetus, and can infect organs other than the lungs in adults. These are the conclusions of authors of an Article in The Lancet.

1 Oct 2007