Latest Pandemic Stories

What do changes in weather and stressed-out birds have to do with your health? In a study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Jeffry Shaman of Columbia University and Marc Lipsitch of Harvard University are beginning to see a new link between La Niña conditions and outbreaks of the flu that could help governments and public health officials determine when the next pandemic will strike. To examine the connection between La Niña and flu pandemics, Shaman and Lipsitch looked...

An international team of researchers has discovered a human genetic flaw that could explain why influenza makes some people more sick than others. Reporting in the journal Nature, British and American researchers, led by the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute (WTSI) in the UK, said the variant of the IFITM3 gene was much more common in people hospitalized for the flu than in those who were able to fight the disease at home. The researchers said this could explain why during the 2009/10...

Predictors of seasonal influenza vaccination among health-care workers in hospitals: A descriptive meta-analysis A belief that the seasonal flu jab really works is far more likely to sway healthcare professionals to get vaccinated than the potential to protect at risk patients from infection, finds research published in Occupational and Environmental Medicine. Healthcare systems in many developed countries have struggled to persuade clinicians on the frontline to have the seasonal flu...

It was assumed that H5N1 bird flu is a rare disease that kills roughly 59 percent of the people it infects, but a new US study published in the journal Science suggests it may be more common and less deadly than previously believed. The research could help alleviate concerns of a worldwide flu pandemic that could kill millions and millions of people, sparked by the recent lab creation of a mutant bird flu strain that can pass easily between animals. The World Health Organization (WHO)...

A World Health Organization (WHO) panel has ruled that a pair of studies detailing how scientists were able to mutate the H5N1 bird flu virus into a strain that could lead to a global pandemic will not be published in the near future, various media outlets reported on Friday. According to Eryn Brown of the Los Angeles Times, a 22-person panel of experts drafted by the WHO decided to extend a moratorium on the research indefinitely, announcing that scientific journals Nature and Science...

Should be considered as a control measure during pandemic outbreaks Closing elementary and secondary schools can help slow the spread of infectious disease and should be considered as a control measure during pandemic outbreaks, according to a McMaster University led study. Using high-quality data about the incidence of influenza infections in Alberta during the 2009 H1N1 flu pandemic, the researchers show that when schools closed for the summer, the transmission of infection from...

The scientists behind a pair of controversial research projects designed to make a deadly strain of bird flu more contagious have agreed to halt their work for 60 days in order to allow experts to determine whether or not the research could lead to a global pandemic or a possible bioterrorism threat. A letter announcing the decision, authored by the three scientists behind the two studies -- Ron Fouchier, Adolfo García-Sastre, and Yoshihiro Kawaoka -- and three dozen other top influenza...

On Friday, the World Health Organization warned scientists who have been involved in engineering a highly pathogenic form of the deadly bird flu virus. The WHO said it was "deeply concerned about the potential negative consequences" of work by two leading flu research teams who said they found ways to make the H5N1 strain into an easily transmissible form. The work was stiffened by U.S. security advisers who wanted the details of how to make the deadly virus unpublished. The U.S....

The U.S. government paid scientists to find out how the bird flu virus might mutate to become a bigger threat to people, but federal officials decided this information should be kept from the public. Federal officials asked the scientists on Tuesday to keep their findings away from being publicized in fear of the wrong people finding out the formula. The two labs in the study found that it appears easier than scientists believed for the H5N1 bird flu to evolve in a way that allows it to...

Animal/Human Connection Means That Veterinarians Monitor Emerging Diseases, Work To Keep People Healthy, Too WASHINGTON, Dec. 20, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- It's not a matter of if a worldwide pandemic will strike but when, say experts like veterinarian and epidemiologist Jonna Mazet, a professor in the Department of Medicine and Epidemiology in the University of California, Davis, School of Veterinary Medicine. That's why Mazet, who leads an early warning pandemic...