The altruistic arm of Internet search engine pioneer Google, Inc. this week said it had given grants of more than $14 million to support physicians working in Southeast Asia and Africa to prevent the next pandemic.

Mountain View, Calif.-based Google.org’s Predict and Prevent initiative is supporting efforts to identify “hot spots” where infectious diseases may emerge, discover new pathogens in animal and human populations, and react to outbreaks before they become global crises.

New lethal infectious diseases crop up every year, Google said, including variants of HIV/AIDS, bird flu and SARS, as well as drug-resistant strains of ancient scourges malaria and tuberculosis.

Google said three-quarters of new diseases are “zoonoses, meaning they’ve jumped from animals to humans.”

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

Posted: October 21st, 2008 under Avian Flu, Clostridium difficile, Developing Diseases, EV71, Ebola Virus, Flesh-Eating Bacteria, HPV, Hendra Virus, Impaired Immunity, Legionnaires' Disease, MRSA, SARS, West Nile Virus.
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A new study shows that men are at high risk of acquiring human papillomavirus (HPV) infections, and the effects of the sexually transmitted disease last about a year.

The study was published in The Journal of Infectious Diseases.

HPV is a cause of genital warts. In recent years, most reports about the disease have focused on its association with cervical cancer.

Back in 2006, an HPV vaccine (Gardasil) designed to prevent cervical cancer was approved for use and a report released yesterday indicates that roughly one quarter of adolescent girls in the U.S. were vaccinated in 2007.

Male-to-female transmission of HPV influences the risk of cancer in women, Dr. Anna R. Giuliano of the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute in Tampa, Florida, and colleagues and sought out more information on the matter.

Researchers conducted a forward-looking study of 290 men from southern Arizona, ages 18-44 years, who were recruited by a variety of means including college posters, encounters at health clinics, and radio and newspaper advertisements.

The participants were examined at the start of the study and were followed for 15.5 months.

– by Gene J. Koprowski, Editorial Director

Posted: October 13th, 2008 under Developing Diseases, HPV.
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Records released by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) demonstrate that the number of deaths linked to the controversial cancer vaccine Gardasil continues to rise. Other complications from the HPV vaccine include shock, foaming at the mouth, convulsions, and paralysis.  HPV, or the human papillomavirus, is sexually transmitted, and is said to cause cervical cancer. Some regulators want to make vaccination with Gardasil mandatory for all young girls.

The documents confirming the deaths were obtained from the FDA by Judicial Watch, a Washington group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, and they provide details of 10 deaths linked to the vaccine since last September.

“Given all the questions about Gardasil, the best public health policy would be to re-evaluate its safety and to prohibit its distribution to minors,” said Judicial Watch’s president, Tom Fitton. “In the least, governments should rethink any efforts to mandate or promote this vaccine for children.”

The organization uncovered reports of about one death each month since last fall, bringing the total death toll from the drug to at least 18 and as many as 20, Judicial Watch said. There also were 140 “serious” reports of complications including about three dozen classified as life-threatening, 10 spontaneous abortions and half a dozen cases of Guillain-Barre Syndrome.

The document reveals the case of an 18-year-old woman who got the Gardasil vaccine, was found unconscious that evening, and died. Another woman, age 19, got the drug and the next morning was found deceased in her bed.

The new documents also reveal a total of 8,864 Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System records, up from a total of 3,461 that had been reported in a document just last fall.

The target of the vaccine is cervical cancer, since studies purport that those who have HPV have a higher chance of later developing cervical cancer. However, opponents note that such cancers develop most often in older women, while the plan is to require girls as young as 11 or 12 years old to be vaccinated.  Teaching abstinence to the girls at a young age may be a better solution, as it prevents infection with HPV, critics note.

– by Gene J. Koprowski, MA, Editorial Director

REFERENCE

http://www.judicialwatch.org/documents/2008/JWReportFDAhpvVaccineRecords.pdf

What’s worse — the disease or the vaccine for HPV?

Posted: July 2nd, 2008 under Developing Diseases, HPV.
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Cancer doctors at the University of Louisville have discovered that the human papillomavirus (HPV) is present in about 33 percent of head and neck cancers reviewed.

According to the American Cancer Society, head and neck cancers account for about five percent of all cancer cases in the United States. They are more common in men over age 50. The cancer society estimates that about 35,000 men and women in the U.S. will develop head or neck cancer in 2008.

Led by Dr. Payal Desai,  the research team looked at tissue samples from 43 patients with head and neck cancer of unknown origin.

Of the samples, 29 percent tested positive for HPV. There are more than 100 different strains of HPV.

“We looked at patients whose cancer couldn’t be linked to a specific source,” Desai said. “Our results indicate that there may be some interaction between HPV infection and smoking and drinking behaviors that contribute to cancer development.”

Other members of the research team were vaccine researchers A. Bennett Jenson and Shin-je Ghim, and cancer center director Donald M. Miller.

They are attempting to build upon the success of the 2005 commercialization of Gardasil, a vaccine used to guard against HPV as a cause of cervical cancer.

“These results indicate that current vaccines, which protect against the HPV 16 virus, could prevent a large number of head and neck cancer cases,” the university said.

– by Gene J. Koprowski, Editorial Director

Posted: June 2nd, 2008 under Developing Diseases, HPV.
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Two-thirds of HIV-positive patients in an Australian cohort have abnormal cells in the anus, and 84 percent have anal infection with strains of human papilloma virus (HPV) that are associated with a high risk of anal cancer, according to a study published in the April edition of the medical journal, Sexually Transmitted Infections.

Researchers discovered that infection with high risk HPV was associated with the presence of high-grade pre-cancerous cells and pre-cancerous cells of undetermined, but potentially high-grade, significance.

Doctors added the following:

* Anal cancer is a serious condition associated with high rates of illness and death.
* The prevalence of anal cancer amongst gay men is thought to be similar tothat amongst women before screening for cervical cancer was introduced.
* Both anal and cervical cancer have been linked to infection with certain strains of HPV.

The study involved 126 patients aged between 18 and 60, most of whom were gay men. All had a CD4 cell count above 300 cells/mm3, the median CD4 cell count being 545 cells/mm3. An undetectable viral load was present in two-thirds of patients. A quarter of individuals had previously been diagnosed with AIDS.

A history of medical or surgical treatment of the anus was present in 25 percent of patients, and 18 percent had had anal warts removed.

Anal cytology results were available for 113 patients, and 85 had cells which were to some extent abnormal. Most patients (106, 84%), had anal infection with a high-risk strain of HPV, and 79 of these individuals had abnormal anal cells.

A total of 16 patients had high-grade pre-cancerous cells changes (high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion, HGSIL), all of whom had anal infection with high-risk strains of HPV.

There was no association between the presence of abnormal anal cells with age, current CD4 cell count, viral load, or previous AIDS-defining illness. But previous anal treatment for warts was associated with the presence of abnormal cells (p = 0.04).

– by the Editors

For further reading:

Anderson J et al. Abnormal anal cytology in high-risk human papilloma virus infection in HIV-infected Australians. Sex Trasm Infect , online edition, April 1st, 2008.

Anal cancer now associated with HIV-positive test results in male patients.

Posted: April 22nd, 2008 under Developing Diseases, Diseases, HIV, HPV.
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