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WHO: ‘No one can predict’ course of China’s new bird flu outbreak

A woman wears a face mask as she walks past a poster showing how to avoid the H7N9 avian influenza virus, by a road in Beijing on April 24, 2013. (AFP)

It is impossible to predict the evolution of China’s human H7N9 bird flu outbreak as researchers are still trying to understand the source of human transmission, the head of the World Health Organisation said Monday. According to the latest official data, H7N9 avian influenza has infected 130 people in China,…

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Three new cases of SARS-like virus in Saudi Arabia

Woman in SARS mask via Shutterstock

Three new cases of a new SARS-like virus have been detected in Saudi Arabia, the World Health Organisation reported Friday. “The Ministry of Health in Saudi Arabia has informed WHO of an additional three laboratory confirmed cases of infection with the novel coronavirus (nCoV),” the UN body said in a…

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As SARS-like virus hits 12th person, WHO urges countries to stay alert

A microscopic view of the coronavirus projected on a screen at the Genome Institute of Singapore, May 9, 2003. File photo via AFP.

The World Health Organisation on Saturday urged countries to be vigilant over the spread of a potentially fatal SARS-like virus after a new case in Britain brought the global number to 12. “Based on the current situation and available information, WHO encourages all Member States to continue their surveillance for…

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Chad officials: No link between meningitis vaccines and sick children

A nurse administers a meningitis vaccine on June 19, 2003. (AFP)

Chad’s government on Tuesday said a team of international experts have not been able to find any links between the hospitalisation of 38 children and their recent vaccinations against meningitis. The children fell ill in the northern village of Gouro and were admitted to hospital after being vaccinated in a…

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WHO: Ebola outbreak in Democratic Republic of Congo stabilizes

A photo released by the World Health Organization in 2007 shows a Doctors Without Borders doctor (R) taking care of a patient suffering from Ebola. (AFP)

An outbreak of Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo has stabilised, with no new deaths or cases in more than a week, the World Health Organisation said Tuesday. For the past 10 days, the death toll from the haemorraghic fever has remained at 36 and no new cases have…

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Smoking in cars higher than UN pollution threshold

woman smoking a cigarette via Shutterstock

Smoking in cars raises levels of dangerous fine-particle pollutants to many times the limit recommended by the world’s health agency, a study published on Monday said. Doctors in Britain measured concentrations of fine particles in cars driven by 17 people, 14 of them smokers, using an electronic monitor on the…

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New mystery virus not easily spread: WHO

Behind air-tight doors in a lab in a southern French city, scientists in protective coveralls wage war against a fingernail-sized danger. Lurking in net cages is their foe: the Asian tiger mosquito, capable of spreading dengue fever and other tropical diseases in temperate Europe. First spotted in Albania in 1979, the black-and-white striped invader has gained a foothold on Europe's Mediterranean rim and is advancing north and west, according to captors' reports. Colonies are established in 20 European countries, in moderate climes as far north as Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands. "The risk of disease is very low but it is growing," entomologist Jean-Baptiste Ferre told AFP at France's leading mosquito-control institute. "The more mosquitoes there are, the higher the risk." The Asian tiger mosquito -- Latin name Aedes albopictus -- can spread many kinds of viruses. They include dengue, which can result in a deadly haemorrhagic fever, as well as West Nile virus, St. Louis encephalitis and a painful disease of the joints called chikungunya. A. albopictus transmits the virus by taking blood from a sick person and handing on the pathogen the next time it takes a meal. The worry is that the insect will spread disease in Europe by biting infected people arriving from tropical countries where the viruses are endemic. In 2007, the tiger mosquito caused a home-grown outbreak in Italy of chikungunya, and in 2010, 10 locally-transmitted cases of dengue occurred in Croatia. That same year, two cases of each disease surfaced in southern France, prompting the alarm bells to ring loudly. From Montpellier, Ferre and his colleagues at the Entente Interdepartementale pour la Demoustication en Mediterranee (EID) monitor the spread with some 1,500 traps dotted around France, luring mosquitoes to lay their eggs. These provide insights into how A. albopictus is adapting to European life, with its varied habitats and cooler climate. Ferre points to maps that begin in 2004, when a tiny red dot represented the first settling of albopictus in France around Menton, near the Italian border. Year by year, the dot grows into red tentacles that probe north and west. The insect has a flight range of only about 200 metres (yards), so it hitch-hikes a ride in cars, trucks and traded goods. With climate change, "further expansion is probable," the journal Vector-Borne and Zoonotic Diseases warned this year. That assessment is supported by scientists at Britain's University of Liverpool who point to warming trends in the Balkans and northwestern Europe. Asian tiger mosquitoes are aggressive and robust, able to breed prolifically in their short, 10-day lives. Feeding during the day, they can bite several people in quick succession, and their offspring can hatch even after long periods without water. Worse, the insect is a stealthy urban dweller. It does not need large, open bodies of water to reproduce, for it can lay its eggs in small, water-holding receptacles such as flowerpots, toys and blocked gutters, and this makes it much harder to fight. Since May this year, surveillance in France has thrown up 267 suspected dengue and chikungunya cases among people who had arrived from abroad, said EID project coordinator Gregory Lambert. The institute sometimes launches pre-emptive strikes if this can prevent the mosquitoes from spreading disease locally. It orders out insecticide trucks that spray streets in a 200-metre (650-foot) radius around the area where a case is notified. The operations take place before dawn, while most people are still in bed. "The imperative is to kill the mosquitoes before they transmit the disease," said Lambert. The war is unrelenting. "It is impossible to kill them all," said Anna-Bella Failloux of France's Pasteur Institute, one of the world's top centres for infectious disease. "Even if there is no mosquito around you, you still have eggs somewhere, waiting for the next rain."

A new mysterious respiratory virus that has killed at least one person and left another in critical condition does not appear very contagious, the World Health Organisation said Friday. “From the information available thus far, it appears that the novel coronavirus cannot be easily transmitted from person to person,” the…

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WHO: One million commit suicide every year

One million people die by their own hand each year, accounting for more deaths than wars and murders put together, the World Health Organisation said Friday, calling for urgent action to address the problem.

One million people die by their own hand each year, accounting for more deaths than wars and murders put together, the World Health Organisation said Friday, calling for urgent action to address the problem. “Data from the WHO indicate that approximately one million people worldwide die by suicide each year.…

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Report: El Niño exacerbates Southeast Asia fire deaths

Indonesia forest fire via AFP

Forest and land fires in Southeast Asia kill an additional 15,000 people annually when the El Niño weather phenomenon grips the region, scientists have estimated. The deaths are caused by higher particle pollution and higher local levels of ozone, both of which are stressors for the lungs and heart, they…

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South Africa recalls 500,000 HIV test kits

A nurse takes a blood sample at an HIV/AIDS clinic in Kiev. Laws that criminalize gay behavior create a a host of legal tangles that waste resources and hinder an effective response to HIV/AIDS worldwide, an independent commission has warned. (AFP Photo/Sergei Supinsky)

South Africa is recalling 500,000 HIV test kits it ordered from a South Korean company despite a World Health Organisation (WHO) warning over inconclusive results, the health ministry said Tuesday. Authorities are investigating how the SD Bioline tests were ordered earlier this year after the WHO issued notices in November…

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