A new vaccine, called MenB, is showing promising results in clinical trials by pharma company Novartis. But doctors cautioned there is still much more research to be done before it can be commercialized. The therapy was tested on 150 babies in the U.K.

Meningitis is an inflammation of the membranes of the brain and the spinal cord.

Doctors regularly immunize babies against Hib, pneumococcol, and meningitis C during their first year of life.

But there is no vaccination yet for meningitis B, which causes most cases, doctors say.

Scientists examined 85 strains of meningitis B while developing the potential vaccine.

The vaccine contains antigens - bacterial proteins — that are found in the meningitis B strains responsible for the disease.

Dr. Ray Borrow, director of the vaccine evaluation department at Manchester Royal Infirmary, said, “the preliminary results tell us that the vaccine is likely to kill strains that contain the vaccine’s antigens.”

Professor David Salisbury, director of immunization at the U.K. Department of Health, said this is a heartening development for medicine.

“We have vaccinations against three of the four causes of bacterial meningitis. The one we have been waiting for is meningitis B. It has been a challenge for the past 20 years,” Dr. Salisbury said.

– by The Editors

Posted: May 15th, 2008 under Diseases, Meningitis.
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An epidemic of Salmonella infections has been traced to contaminated dry dog food, the first time such a link has been discovered, U.S. health officials report. These infections from dry dog food may be an “under-recognized source of illness in people,” especially young children, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “This is the first human illness linked to dry dog food,” said CDC epidemiologist, Dr. Casey Barton Behravesh, who co-authored a report on the finding.The CDC does not know exactly how the Salmonella bacteria got into the dog food, the doctor adds.

Posted: May 15th, 2008 under Developing Diseases, Diseases, Salmonella.
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Chinese health officials this week confirmed the first child death of hand-foot-mouth disease (HFMD) in the capital of Beijing.

According to a report carried by the Xinhua News Service, Deng Xiaohong, spokeswoman of the Beijing Health Bureau, indicated that the child, a resident of Chaoyang District, had died on the way to a hospital last week.

She said that the child had tested positive for enterovirus 71 (EV71), a virus that has caused the majority of HFMD deaths overall in China.

The spokeswoman also indicated that another child from north China’s Hebei Province had died of HFMD at a Beijing hospital.

“Under the disease counting regulations of the Ministry of Health, the child from Hebei was not counted in Beijing’s disease toll,” Deng said.

Hebei Province neighbors Beijing, but had not previously reported any child death from the awful disease.

– by The Editors

Hand-foot-mouth disease claims another victim — a child — in China.

Posted: May 14th, 2008 under Developing Diseases, EV71, Impaired Immunity.
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Monsoon rains have now arrived in Burma, and thousands of homeless people are sleeping in the open on sodden ground 11 days after deadly Cyclone Nargis landed. Rice spoils in the damp air, and health officials are predicting “massive death and illness” from related epidemics.

The aid shipments that have arrived are backed up at Rangoon’s main airport, but officials fear a lack of warehouse space will expose them to the rain. Supplies of water, purification tablets, and equipment are stalled in neighboring countries, pending approval from the ruling military regime.

“I can’t think of a worse scenario for the development of water-borne infections than the one in Burma,” says Dr. William Bowie, an infectious disease expert. “Malnourished folk already have compromised immune systems.”

The weather is increasing the health threats.

“Where I am now there’s over 10,000 homeless people and it’s pouring rain,” Bridget Gardener, an International Red Cross official told reporters this week in the disaster zone of the Irrawaddy delta.

Two American relief flights arrived yesterday, following the landing of an Australian Air Force plane brimming with emergency supplies.

But Oxfam spokesperson Alexander Woollcombe says “air drops can only be partial and give the illusion that the situation is addressed.”

Experts say the risk of infection increases daily. Starving people are eating contaminated food and drink brackish water from streams awash with decomposing bodies of humans.

Cholera, malaria, and typhoid are among the leading likely diseases, as are hepatitis A and leptospirosis, a deadly bacterial disease.

– by Gene J. Koprowski, Editorial Director, and Nancy Bruening, Associate Managing Editor

Spoiled rice may kill thousands more in Burma.

Posted: May 14th, 2008 under Developing Diseases, Diseases, Hepatitis, Malaria.
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Scientists are working to help doctors in parts of Asia where tuberculosis (TB) and HIV have reached epidemic proportions, as they note that cells targeted by HIV infection are the same cells required to fight TB.

There has been a 140 percent increase in cases of TB over the past five years in Asia, most due to the HIV epidemic, scientists told the Royal Australasian College of Physicians (RACP) annual Congress.

Professor Suzanne Crowe said cells targeted by HIV infection were the same cells required to fight TB and mount “an effective immune response.”

As HIV infection progresses, the number of lymphocytes decrease and macrophages don’t function properly. The macrophage is normally responsible for ingesting and killing the TB bacillus.

“Thus, reactivation of TB is more common and there is increased risk of new infection in HIV-infected persons,” the researcher said.  “What is generally lacking in Asia-Pacific are highly skilled doctors who can manage HIV infection. There is a lack of access to low-cost tests which are needed to monitor HIV infection,” she said.

The infectious diseases expert at Melbourne’s, The Alfred hospital, said she was involved in developing a low-cost test that would be a bit like a dipstick used for a pregnancy test.

Of the 33.2 million people in the world living with HIV, 8.3 million are in Asia and 78,000 are in Oceania.

– by Gene J. Koprowski, MA, Editorial Director and Nancy Bruening, Associate Managing Editor

Posted: May 13th, 2008 under HIV, Impaired Immunity, Tuberculosis.
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The American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy (ASGE) this week issued its new infection control guidelines regarding gastrointestinal (GI) endoscopy — guidelines which appear in the May issue of the medical journal, GIE: Gastrointestinal Endoscopy.

Endoscopy is a procedure that uses an endoscope, a thin, flexible tube with a light and a lens on the end to look into the esophagus, stomach, duodenum, small intestine, colon, or rectum, in order to diagnose or treat a condition.

There are many types of endoscopy, including colonoscopy, sigmoidoscopy, gastroscopy, enteroscopy, and esophogogastroduodenoscopy (EGD).

“Despite the large number and variety of GI endoscopic procedures performed, documented instances of infectious complications remain rare, with an estimated frequency of 1 in 1.8 million procedures,” says Dr. Todd H. Baron, MD, FASGE, chairman of the ASGE standards of practice committee.

The guidelines are issued to disseminate information to promote understanding, which leads to the prevention of infection as a result of a GI endoscopy. Circumstances in which an endoscopy-related infection might occur are discussed in the document, as are measures to prevent such infection, including endoscope reprocessing, antibiotic prophylaxis, and protection of endoscopy personnel.

The single best protection against patient-to-patient transmission of micro-organisms by an endoscopy is stringent reprocessing of endoscopes after each clinical use.

Endoscopy personnel may, however, facilitate transmission of infection from patient to patient if they fail to carefully adhere to general infection control principles. In particular, appropriate aseptic techniques and safe injection practices should be followed. Improper reuse of syringes and the use of contaminated multiple dose drug vials have been linked to the transmission of hepatitis B and C between consecutive patients treated at health care facilities.

Such practices “should be avoided,” and single use drug vials are recommended. Similarly, use of gloves by health care workers was shown to decrease the incidence of Clostridium difficile associated diarrhea and the point prevalence of asymptomatic C. difficile carriage in inpatients, according to the society.

– by Gene J. Koprowski, MA, Editorial Director

Infection Control Guidelines

* Lapses in currently accepted endoscope reprocessing protocols, or defective equipment, are the primary causes of infection.

* Endoscopes should undergo high-level disinfection as recommended by governmental agencies and all pertinent professional organizations for the reprocessing of GI endoscopes.

* Extensive training of staff involved in endoscopic reprocessing is mandatory for quality assurance and for effective infection control.

Source: The American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy

Posted: May 13th, 2008 under Clostridium difficile, Developing Diseases, Impaired Immunity, MRSA.
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A new study from this month’s issue of the medical journal Pediatrics indicates that exposure to maternal infections in the womb increases the odds of epilepsy in childhood. Among the infections cited were cystitis, or inflammation of the bladder, pyelonephritis, the inflammation of the kidney and upper urinary tract, and vaginal yeast infection.

“If some of these associations are causal, then they could be related to the infection itself or to its consequences, such as change in diet or dehydration, and possibly to its treatment,” the research team indicated.

The study involved 90,619 infants born between September 1997 and June 2003 and followed through December 2005.

Researcher Dr. Yuelian Sun, from the University of Aarhus in Denmark, and colleagues, identified 646 children who were diagnosed with epilepsy during the years of follow-up.

– by The Editors

Posted: May 12th, 2008 under Developing Diseases.
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Spanish health officials this weekend began an investigation into the deaths of at least 18 people from a bacterial epidemic at one of Madrid’s main hospitals.

Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega described the outbreak as “very, very serious.”

More than 250 patients have been infected in the last 20 months in Madrid from the disease, a virulent bacteria known as Acinetobacter baumannii. Acinetobacter baumannii usually infects those in intensive care with fragile immune systems and can lead quickly to pneumonia. It is easily transmitted from hospital equipment or from patient to patient.

The situation is so precarious that the hospital’s intensive care unit had to be destroyed so that a new, non-contaminated structure could be built in its place.

Doctors at the university hospital tried to play down the consequences of the bacterial epidemic.

The bacterium “contributed to the death” of other patients but “had not been the determining factor,” Juan Carlos Montejo, a doctor at the hospital, was quoted as saying by El Pais, the daily Spanish newspaper.

A similar nosocomial infection — Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) — has been at the center of a global scare surrounding bacteria that are immune to most antibiotics.

The European Center for Disease Prevention and Control warned last year that “healthcare-associated infections” such as MRSA and Acinetobacter baumannii, are “the biggest infectious disease challenge facing the EU.”

– by The Editors

Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega described the outbreak as “very, very serious.”

Posted: May 12th, 2008 under Developing Diseases, Impaired Immunity.
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A teenager who tried to pierce his lip with a needle from a first-aid kit wound up with a staph infection that nearly killed him, according to Kansas City-area doctors.

Young Zeke Wheeler is recovering at Children’s Mercy Hospital after enduring surgeries on his knees and hips to remove the drug-resistant infection called Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus virus.

The 15-year-old high school freshman still must undergo heart surgery, more hospitalization and a long course of antibiotics.

The boy’s father — John Wheeler — says that the boy was at home ill with the flu and bronchitis last month, and, apparently bored, tried to pierce his lower lip.

A week later the boy presented at an emergency room with fever, where he was diagnosed with a viral infection. Not until he was at Children’s Mercy was he found to have MRSA, doctors say.

According to Dr. Robyn Livingston, director of Infection Control at Children’s Mercy Hospital, “if MRSA gets into the blood stream, you’re talking about infection on the heart, pneumonia, into the bone that may require surgical intervention.”

Every part of Wheeler’s body is now affected, the doctor adds.

– by The Editors

Teenage body piercing — stupid and potentially deadly.

Posted: May 9th, 2008 under Developing Diseases, Impaired Immunity, MRSA.
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The U.S. government has offered to assist China in its battle against a viral infection that has killed 34 children, and afflicted thousands of others.

U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt is making a trip to Beijing next week and plans to discuss health issues with Chinese officials, with the outbreaks of “hand, foot, and mouth disease expected to feature prominently,” U.S. Embassy spokeswoman, Susan Stevenson, says.

The scope of infections brings to mind the SARS epidemic of 2003, when China was criticized internationally for trying to conceal the emergence of the disease. American health experts have previously helped study and control infectious diseases like SARS in China.

The most recent deaths happened in the central province of Anhui, where 22 children have died of hand, foot, and mouth disease, the provincial health bureau said on its Internet site.

The government said serious cases, however, were on the decline in Fuyang city, the site of the most infections and where the first wave of outbreaks was reported.

As of late Thursday, the number of reported cases countrywide jumped to 24,932, the official Xinhua News Agency said — up 25 percent from 19,962 a day earlier.  New cases have popped up from Guangdong province in the south to Jilin province in the northeast, along with major cities like Shanghai and Beijing.

– by The Editors

A positive staining of EV71.

Posted: May 9th, 2008 under Developing Diseases, EV71, Impaired Immunity, SARS.
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