Recent News

By Region: Asia/Pacific

Long wet season spawns rising dengue cases

(JakartaPost) The Health Ministry expects an increase in the number of dengue fever cases this year, the first time in three years, due to the prolonged wet season. “As of May 2013, Jakarta had already seen 3,119 cases of dengue fever, almost half of last year’s. The trend has repeated in other provinces,” Tjandra Yoga Read More »

July 8, 2013
| Filed under Asia/Pacific, Europe, North America, and International
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Immunization Strategies Improved For Dengue Fever In Thailand

(MedicalNewsToday) Using a unique data set spanning 40 years of dengue fever incidence in Thailand, an international team led by biostatistician Nicholas Reich at the University of Massachusetts Amherst has for the first time estimated from data that after an initial dengue infection, a person is protected from infection with other strains for between one Read More »

July 8, 2013
| Filed under Asia/Pacific, North America, and International
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New studies fine-tune H7N9 severity estimates

(CIDRAP) A lull in the number of H7N9 cases in China has given experts a chance to sift the data to fine-tune the clinical picture of the disease, which now suggests that it is less serious than earlier assessments, with more mild infections than previously thought. Some of the obstacles to gauging H7N9’s true severity Read More »

July 5, 2013
| Filed under Asia/Pacific, Europe, North America, Agents & Toxins, International, and Research
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World’s food standard body praised as safety net for consumers

(WHO) As Codex Alimentarius, the world’s top food standard body for consumer protection and fair practices in international food trade, celebrated its 50th anniversary, the FAO and WHO Directors-General and national governments united in their praise for its benefits. “Today, Codex standards are the benchmark standards for food safety. There is no competition,” Dr. Margaret Read More »

July 3, 2013
| Filed under Asia/Pacific, Europe, North America, South America, Biosafety, and International
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H7N9 bird flu less deadly than H5N1: researchers

(BusinessStandard) The H7N9 avian influenza, which was first reported in humans in China this year causing 37 deaths, has a lower fatality risk than H5N1-type bird flu that emerged in 2003, researchers said today. A study by researchers from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention in Beijing and the University of Hong Kong Read More »