• Drug-resistant Salmonella outbreak in seven states

    The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said that seven strains of Salmonella Heidelberg bacteria have been identified as being linked to an outbreak in seven states. The outbreak, associated with Foster Farm chicken product, has so far sickened 278 people. The outbreak strains of Salmonella Heidelberg are resistant to several commonly prescribed antibiotics. The CDC unit tracking disease outbreaks has been working with less than half its personnel since the government shutdown began, and had had to call back thirty furloughed inspectors.

  • Dog's mood offers insight into owner’s wellbeing

    Researchers are using movement sensors to track normal dog behavior while the animals are both home alone and out-and-about. Providing a unique insight into the secret life of man’s best friend, the sensors show not only when the dog is on the move, but also how much he is barking, sitting, digging, and other key canine behaviors.

  • New view of dengue fever

    By Anne Trafton

    Dengue fever is a mosquito-borne illness that infects at least fifty million people worldwide each year. This infectious tropical disease is found in more than 100 countries, and it has no cure and no vaccine. One reason why it has been difficult to develop new drugs for dengue fever is that there are no good animal models of the disease, which only infects humans. Researchers have now produced a “humanized mouse” that mimics many features of the human immune system. These mice with human immune cells help researchers discover how the mosquito-borne virus depletes blood platelets.

  • Helping farmers plow through new, complex food safety regulations

    The recently passed Food Safety Modernization Act set safety standards on how farmers grow, harvest, and handle fresh produce to reduce the risk of foodborne diseases. The new regulations to minimize food safety risk include testing for water safety and better managing manure storage. Agricultural extension educators should take a flexible approach in teaching farmers about the changing landscape of food safety regulations, researchers say.

  • Bolstering water security in a crowded world

    With limited water and the increasing number of people depending on it – there will be more than nine billion people on the planet by 2050 — water security is tenuous. Integrated water management plans using “blue,” “green,” and “gray” water, however, can increase water security by allowing agriculture to rise to the challenge of feeding a growing world population while leaving enough water for other uses.

  • Facebook, Twitter may yield clues on how to prevent the spread of disease

    Cold and flu season prompts society to find ways to prevent the spread of disease though measures like vaccination all the way through to covering our mouths when we cough and staying in bed. These social responses are much more difficult to predict than the way biological contagion will evolve, but new methods are being developed to do just that. Facebook and Twitter could provide vital clues to control infectious diseases by using mathematical models to understand how we respond socially to biological contagions.

  • Predicting violence among psychopaths no more accurate than tossing a coin

    Risk assessment tools used to predict prisoner re-offending are no more accurate than tossing a coin when it comes to psychopaths, according to new research. The researchers say the findings — which also show the tools perform at best moderately in those with depression, drug and alcohol dependence, and schizophrenia — have major implications for risk assessment in criminal populations.

  • Making clean drinking water universally available “achievable”

    More than 780 million people around the world still do not have safe and reliable drinking water. The problem of providing clean water is most acute in developing countries, particularly in Africa, where creaking infrastructures struggle to keep pace with fast-growing urban populations; in rural areas, millions of water pumps stand unused waiting to be repaired.

  • Toxic threats: More mercury released to the environment

    Mercury, especially in the form of methylmercury, is an extremely toxic chemical to all life forms. It occurs both naturally and as the result of human activities. A majority of mercury releases to the environment presently are atmosphere emissions from human activities, and reemissions of previously deposited mercury from soils and the oceans. The largest sources of man-made mercury emissions are small-scale gold mining and burning coal for electrical generation.

  • “In 30 years Iran will be a ghost town” if the country’s water situation does not improve

    Issa Kalantari, a former agriculture minister during the presidency of Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani and currently and advisor to President Hassan Rouhani’s cabinet, says Iran’s water crisis was especially grave. “Our main problem that threatens us, that is more dangerous than Israel, America or political fighting, is the issue of living in Iran. It is that the Iranian plateau is becoming uninhabitable”; “If this situation is not reformed, in 30 years Iran will be a ghost town.”

  • Universal flu vaccine within sight

    Researchers asked volunteers to donate blood samples just as the swine flu pandemic was getting underway and report any symptoms they experienced over the next two flu seasons. They found that those who avoided severe illness had more CD8 T cells, a type of virus-killing immune cell, in their blood at the start of the pandemic. The researchers believe a vaccine that stimulates the body to produce more of these cells could be effective at preventing flu viruses, including new strains that cross into humans from birds and pigs, from causing serious disease.

  • Today’s worst watershed stresses in U.S. may become tomorrow’s new normal

    Nearly one in ten U.S. watersheds is “stressed,” with demand for water exceeding natural supply, according to a new analysis of surface water in the United States. What is more, the lowest water flow seasons of recent years — times of great stress on rivers, streams, and sectors that use their waters — are likely to become typical as climates continue to warm.

  • Untreatable: the growing menace of drug-resistant health threats

    Every year, more than two million people in the United States get infections which are resistant to antibiotics and at least 23,000 people die as a result, according to a new report issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A new report ranks threats, outlines four core actions to halt resistance.

  • USDA plans to expand private meat inspection scheme despite criticism

    The USDA’s plan to expand a pilot program which shifts responsibility from government inspectors at meat processing plants to private or company-employed inspectors has faced skepticism and criticism. The pilot plan was supposed to be evaluated, but the USDA Inspector General reported that the department has yet to study the effectiveness of the plan in improving food safety and efficiency in the plants. Critics say the replacement of government inspectors has led to an increase in the number of instances of contaminated meat in the U.S. plants which have adopted the plan – and also in the Canadian and Australian meat plant where the scheme has been implemented.

  • U.S. makes progress toward a National Water Census

    Growing populations, increased energy development, and the uncertain effects of a changing climate magnify the need for an improved understanding of water use and water availability. No comprehensive and current national assessment of water resources exists, however. A USGS report released in April, Progress Toward Establishing a National Assessment of Water Availability and Use, fulfilled a requirement under the 2009 SECURE Water Act for the Secretary of the Interior to report to Congress on progress made in implementing the national water availability and use assessment program, also referred to as a National Water Census.