The varroa mite is causing a highly contagious virus to proliferate in honeybee colonies here and around the globe, Hawaii and British researchers have found.
Researchers from the University of Hawaii, the University of Sheffield in South Yorkshire, the British Marine Biological Association, and the British Food and Environmental Research Agency studied the pest in Hawaii.
Their research, reported Friday in the journal Science, showed how the varroa mite caused the virus, a known pathogen, to increase its frequency among honeybee colonies to 100 percent from 10 percent.
The study showed that along with this change, a millionfold increase in the number of virus particles infect- ing each bee and a huge reduction in viral strain diversity led to the single virulent virus that deforms wings.
US computer security researchers said Sunday that the Flame computer virus that smoldered undetected for years in Middle Eastern energy facilities has gotten orders to vanish, leaving no trace. Anti-virus company Symantec ...
SEVERAL farmers living with HIV/Aids have embraced the cultivation of Orange Fleshed Sweet Potatoes, a type of root crop that curbs malnutrition, disease and hunger as well as generates income in their communities.
Cacearpedo, a sweet potato variety containing vitamin A. The New Times / D. Umutesi.
Through cooperatives that comprise of youth and energetic elderly people mostly women, connected to the Forum for Agriculture Research in Africa (FARA) have garnered efforts to become both economically empowered and physically healthy.
GlobalPostGroups fighting HIV/AIDS in DC find lessons in AfricaGlobalPostPart Two: Washington's HIV infection rates are comparable to many African countries, which have provided critical insight into the epidemic.
"Historical sources abound in references to outbreaks of a disease resembling dengue fever. Medical observers reported on its rapid onset and great expansion in the population, the diversity and changeability of its clinical features and its overall mildness. In 1874, an epidemic disease with fever, rash and rheumatic pains as main symptoms broke out in the Portuguese colony of Macau, South China. It was similar to the epidemic disease which swept the colony 2 years before during the socalled dengue pandemic of 1870–1873. The 1874 epidemic disease was variously labeled by local physicians, including dengue fever. In his report on the disease, Dr. Lúcio Augusto da Silva, hence at the head of the health services of Macau, discussed on the nature of the epidemic febrile disease. Here, I review the data on the 1874 epidemic outbreak and put them in the context of historical dengue-like outbreaks. A possible Chikungunya etiology of the disease is postulated."
Nice history of dengue and related virus outbreaks
"The influenza virus H1N1 pandemic of 1918 was one of the worst medical catastrophes in human history. Recent studies have demonstrated that the hemagglutinin (HA) protein of the 1918 virus and 2009 H1N1 pandemic virus [A(H1N1)pdm09], the latter now a component of the seasonal trivalent inactivated influenza vaccine (TIV), share cross-reactive antigenic determinants. In this study, we demonstrate that immunization with the 2010-2011 seasonal TIV induces neutralizing antibodies that cross-react with the reconstructed 1918 pandemic virus in ferrets. TIV-immunized ferrets subsequently challenged with the 1918 virus displayed significant reductions in fever, weight loss, and virus shedding compared to these parameters in nonimmune control ferrets. Seasonal TIV was also effective in protecting against the lung infection and severe lung pathology associated with 1918 virus infection. Our data demonstrate that prior immunization with contemporary TIV provides cross-protection against the 1918 virus in ferrets. These findings suggest that exposure to A(H1N1)pdm09 through immunization may provide protection against the reconstructed 1918 virus which, as a select agent, is considered to pose both biosafety and biosecurity threats."
So, all you doomsayers - and yes, NSABB, I'm talkin' to YOU - as expected by some, the resurrected Spanish Flu virus is NOT going to be an all-conquering scourge that depopulates the planet if it gets out. Basically, anyone who has either had the H1N12009pdm or the modern vaccine, is almost certainly protected against the old virus.
CIO TodayFlame virus can hijack PCs by spoofing Windows UpdateCNETUsing rogue security certificates, the virus is able to exploit Microsoft's Windows Update service to infect unsuspecting computers.
BigPond NewsAustralia warns of new flu strainThe Sun DailyMELBOURNE (June 6, 2012): A new strain of flu from the northern hemisphere is likely to spread through Australia this winter, health authorities said.
"Cannabis Science is excited it has the opportunity to present our initial clinical premise during the 19th IAC. Targeting HIV TAT via the antiviral effects of phytocannabioids has the potential to positively impact on millions of persons infected with HIV. We anticipate that CS-TATI-1 will slow the development of the disease as well as the development of resistance treatment."
And take your mind off the problem quite nicely, I imagine, while improving your appetite.
World Health Organization announcement follows earlier warnings from the CDC.
First, it was the Centers for Disease Control—now, the World Health Organization is warning that Gonorrhea could join herpes and HIV/AIDS as "uncurable" sexually-transmitted diseases.
Right, so now gonorrhoea joins the zoo as an honorary virus - because, like TB, multi-drug resistant gonorrhoea really is something to worry about.
Malawi's new president, Joyce Banda, has inherited an unenviable to-do list from former president Bingu wa Mutharika, and AIDS activists are hoping that bolstering the donor-dependent AIDS response will be one of her most urgent priorities.
"Endogenous viral elements (EVEs) derived from RNA viruses with no DNA stage are rare, especially those where the parental viruses possess single-strand positive-sense (ssRNA +) genomes. Here we provide evidence that EVEs that share a sequence similarity to ssRNA + viruses of plants are integrated into the genomes of a number of insects, including mosquito, fruit flies, bees, ant, silkworm, pea aphid, Monarch butterfly, and wasps. A preliminary phylogenetic analysis places these EVEs as divergent relatives of the Virgaviridae and three currently unclassified plant viral species."
I have covered this before, in ViroBlogy, as an interesting and probably under-appreciated phenomenon. I note Eddie Holmes and colleagues have now taken it much, much further - which incidentally lends significant credence to my supposition that virus/vector/plant coevolution was probably a fair bit more intimate than has been supposed, with the newly-emerged (in evolutionary terms) insects and their viruses meeting terrestrial plants and THEIR viruses. And mixing everything up.
I thank Jean-Marie Verchot for drawing my attention to this!
"What links South African president Jacob Zuma’s penis, the Muppet Show and Bill Clinton?
An unlikely trio, granted, but connected by all too-sad extent of HIV infection rates in Zuma’s country.
Zuma’s genitals have been in the news after vandals defaced a portrait of the politician that showed his penis on display.
The Guardian quoted an essay accompanying the exhibit by Brett Murray, called Spear, saying it formed “part of a vitriolic and succinct censure of bad governance and are [Murray's] attempts to humorously expose the paucity of morals and greed within the ruling elite”."
"A nationwide drop in the number of genital warts cases has been attributed to the controversial HPV vaccine, which is free for teenage girls.
Sexual health clinics reported a 10 per cent decrease in genital warts last year compared to 2010, according to the Institute of Environmental Science and Research's annual report on sexually transmitted infections.
Family Planning national medical advisor Christine Roke attributed the fewer first-time cases of genital warts to the HPV vaccine, which was introduced in late 2008.
"It reduces the chances of getting warts if people have it before they are sexually active."
The vaccine – now a routine immunisation for 12-year-old girls – aims to protect women against human papillomavirus and the risk of developing cervical cancer later in life."
Nice example of the knock-on effect in public health due to a vaccine - in this case, even though only girls are getting the papillomavirus vaccine, bot sexes are protected against spread of genital warts caused by the viruses.
PARIS — Scientists on Sunday said they had found a key piece in the puzzle as to why a tiny minority of individuals infected with HIV have a natural ability to fight off the deadly AIDS virus. In a study they said holds promise for an HIV vaccine, researchers from four countries reported the secret lies not in the number of infection-killing cells a person has, but in how well they work. Only about one person in 300 has the ability to control the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) without drugs, using a strain of "killer" cells called cytotoxic T lymphocyte (CTL) cells, previous research has found. Taking that discovery further, scientists from the United States, Canada, Japan and Germany reported that the strain has molecules called receptors that are better able to identify HIV-infected white blood cells for attack.
SMART biochip can speedily detect flu vi...The biochip, designed by Brown University research...SMART stands for "A Simple Method for Amplify...There are other pathogen-diagnostic detectors, not...The SMART detector is ...
"In the latest exploration into the universe of organisms inhabiting our bodies, microbiologists have discovered new viral genes in faeces. They find that the composition of virus populations inhabiting the tail ends of healthy intestines (as represented in our stools) is unique to each individual and stable over time. Even identical twins — who share many of the same intestinal bacteria — differed in their gut's viral make-up."
And I like this comment:
"In oceans, the modality of viruses has tended to be predatory," comments Edward DeLong at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. "Now the interesting thing here is that the system in the faecal microbiota seems to be driven by prophages, which tend to basically integrate their genetic material into the host genome and hide there — it's a much more stable situation."
Thanks to Paul Kennedy in my lab, who reminded me of this.
"A swell in new cases of narcolepsy in China followed seasonal patterns of flu, including H1N1, according to a recent study led by Dr. Emmanuel Mignot of the Stanford University School of Medicine. The new cases appear to be associated with flu infection itself, not with flu vaccinations.
A peak in cases of narcolepsy — an autoimmune disease that causes people to fall asleep suddenly — occurred about five to seven months after a peak in cold and flu cases in the country, the study found. Onset in the spring was seven times more common than in the winter."
I post this because of people increasingly spreading disinformation about the flu vaccines causing narcolepsy - while this may happen (see earlier Scoop), it is possible the virus itself, or a couple of its proteins, are what is doing it. See http://www.thelocal.se/41180/20120601/
Read the true story of the LQP-79 virus infection that is spreading across North American at http://lqp-79.org . Find out what the government conspiracy does...
OK, last one on Viral Zombie Apocalypses, I promise!
William Bynum reviews No Time to Lose: A Life in Pursuit of Deadly Viruses by Peter Piot.
"The first quarter of "No Time to Lose" describes Dr. Piot's hair-raising adventures investigating this still mysterious disease in Zaire, as the present-day Democratic Republic of the Congo was then called. Many of the Ebola cases seemed to be related to a mission hospital in Yambuku, a remote hamlet in the middle of dense rain forests. Dr. Piot and his colleagues systematically surveyed the surrounding villages for signs of the disease. They found many, gradually putting together a picture of how the virus was spread: through improperly sterilized needles used in medical injections and the close contact involved in preparing a victim for burial. Dirty needles were the key. Here Dr. Piot makes a point that he repeats later in the book: It is not enough to want to do good. The good intentions must be backed by knowledge and careful attention to best practice."
Amen to that. And nuns: they forgot to mention nuns as a means of transmission - via dirty needles, of course.
The Dengue Vaccine Initiative is something new to me - but it is a very useful site that gives a lot of news about progress in this regard in a very civilian-friendly way.
Adam Baker, author of Outpost and Juggernaut, shares a few survival tips for surviving the zombie apocalypse.
I thought I'd include this useful little "how to survive" video, seeing as engineered rabies viruses and whatnot will shortly precipitate the Viral Zombie Apocalypse...B-)
"A new Swedish study shows that all Swedes who developed narcolepsy from the swine flu vaccine Pandemrix received the vaccine from 12 of the 35 batches, despite the claim by the responsible agency that no such connection exists."
There are some slightly disturbing connections between the H1N1 2009 pdm virus and narcolepsy: the virus itself seems to have caused narcolepsy in some of those infected; now a vaccine is implicated - is this an innate property of certain of the virus proteins, possibly?
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