Ebola Infects 17 More in DRC Outbreak (CIDRAP) The Democratic Republic of the Congo today reported another double-digit rise in Ebola cases, as local leaders such as traditional chiefs and provincial representatives stepped up their efforts to convince community members to support the response efforts to end the outbreak. Go to article
A Measles Case Has Hit Google's Silicon Valley Headquarters (Buzz Feed News) As Google fights criticism that it has let anti-vaccine disinformation flourish on its platform, the tech giant’s Silicon Valley campus, where thousands work, is now confronting its own in-house case of measles as the virus resurges across the US.Go to article
China Urges Large Pig Farms to Test for African Swine Fever (Reuters) China will allow large-scale pig farms and breeding farms to test for African swine fever in a bid to help early detection of the disease, overturning an earlier prohibition on commercial firms carrying out their own testing.Go to article
Domestic Preparedness & Response
Experts Meet in Washington to Discuss How to Prevent the Next Deadly Biological Threat (FierceHealthcare) It is only a “matter of time” until the world finds itself racing to protect itself against the next pathogen. So on Wednesday, a group about 200 experts from government agencies, universities and private companies who attended the National Biodefense Summit to talk about how to stop it.Go to article
Global Health Security
First Red Cross Aid Distributed in Crisis-torn Venezuela (AP) Red Cross volunteers distributed the first shipment of badly needed emergency supplies in Venezuela on Tuesday after months of feuding between the government, which has denied the existence of a humanitarian crisis, and opponents who have been seeking to use the delivery of aid to force President Nicolás Maduro from power.Go to article
2017 Pneumonic Plague Outbreak in Madagascar Characterized by Scientists (Science Daily) Plague is an endemic disease in Madagascar. Each year there is a seasonal upsurge between September and April, especially in the Central Highlands, which stand at an elevation of more than 800m. In 2017, an unprecedented pneumonic plague outbreak hit the main island, primarily affecting the capital Antananarivo and the main port city of Toamasina.Go to article
Medicine & Public Health
Access Barriers to Antibiotics (Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics & Policy) The emergence and proliferation of antimicrobial resistance have rendered some currently available antibiotics ineffective. Drug-resistant bacterial infections pose a growing mortality threat to populations around the world while many people in low- and middle-income countries continue to die because they lack access to antibiotics. The majority of the world’s annual 5.7 million antibiotic-treatable deaths occur in LMICs where the mortality burden from treatable bacterial infections far exceeds the estimated annual 700,000 deaths from antibiotic-resistant infections.Go to article
NYC Extends Measles Vaccination Order (AP) New York City’s Board of Health has voted to extend last week’s emergency declaration ordering mandatory measles vaccinations in four Brooklyn ZIP codes. The continuing order, which was voted unanimously on Wednesday, will end when health officials declare the emergency is over. It applies to children ages 6 months and older with fines for noncompliance.Go to article
Using Healthcare-seeking Behaviour to Estimate the Number of Nipah Outbreaks Missed by Hospital-based Surveillance in Bangladesh (International Journal of Epidemiology) Understanding the true burden of emergent diseases is critical for assessing public-health impact. However, surveillance often relies on hospital systems that only capture a minority of cases. We use the example of Nipah-virus infection in Bangladesh, which has a high case-fatality ratio and frequent person-to-person transmission, to demonstrate how healthcare-seeking data can estimate true burden.Go to article
Medicine & Public Health
‘Partly Alive’: Scientists Revive Cells in Brains from Dead Pigs (New York Times) In a study that raises profound questions about the line between life and death, researchers have restored some cellular activity to brains removed from slaughtered pigs. The brains did not regain anything resembling consciousness: There were no signs indicating coordinated electrical signaling, necessary for higher functions like awareness and intelligence.Go to article
He Jiankui (Time) Scientist He Jiankui showed the world how human embryo editing is relatively easy to do but incredibly difficult to do well. Going against the consensus in the scientific community that CRISPR-Cas9 technology is still too experimental and dangerous to use in human embryos, he applied it to forever change the genomes of twin girls to give them immunity to HIV. Go to article
Powerful CRISPR Cousin Accidentally Mutates RNA While Editing DNA Target (Science) When researchers first reported 3 years ago that they had created base editors, a version of the powerful genome-editing tool CRISPR, excitement swirled around their distinct powers to more subtly alter DNA compared with CRISPR itself. But the weaknesses of base editors have become increasingly apparent, and a new study shows they can also accidentally mutate the strands of RNA that help build proteins or perform other key cellular tasks. Researchers say this could complicate developing safe therapies with the technology and hamper other research applications. Go to article
Transparency and Trust: Is There Room for ‘The People’ in the Human Gene Editing Debate? (Genetic Literacy Project) Following on the heels of last year’s news that the world’s first gene-edited babies were created, scientists and policy-makers worldwide are grappling with the question of how to regulate gene-editing technology. The WHO recently concluded its first meeting of an “expert working group” whose goal is to “promote transparency and trustworthy practices.” At the same time, a quorum of leading scientists recently called for a moratorium on “heritable genome editing” similarly in the interests of promoting “transparency” and to curtail “eroding public trust.” Go to article
