• Deadly avian flu virus found in wild duck in Germany

    German authorities discovered the virus in a wild duck shot during a hunt near Starnberg, in Bavaria; this is the first case of a virus found in a wild bird for over a year

  • Human vaccine against bird flu a reality with new discovery

    Aussie researchers added a compound, known to increase immunity, to the flu vaccine in an animal model; the addition of this compound promoted significant generation of potent killer T cell immunity and provided protection from infection

  • Web site to offer real-time information on food in stores

    Consumer Web site adds food rating to its roster of consumer safety and carbon-footprint ratings for non-food goods; food sold in supermarkets around the globe will be rated in terms of chemicals, colorings, additives, and nutrition

  • Innovative pandemic flu vaccine effective against H5N1 in mice

    The current method of growing seasonal influenza vaccines in chicken eggs is slow and inefficient; Emory University scientists have developed an alternative: virus-like particles, empty shells that look like viruses but do not replicate

  • Scientists reveal how culprit in 2001 anthrax attacks was found

    Scientists unveil evidence that shows how the FBI traced the spores used in the attacks to a single flask at a U.S. government lab —but evidence does not explain why the FBI made Bruce Ivins, who worked at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID), the chief suspect; that evidence may have to wait the end of legal skirmishes in the matter

  • Salmonella contamination found at Texas peanut plant

    Salmonella found in ground peanuts in a Plainview, Texas plant which received peanuts from the now-bankrupt Georgia peanut processing company; contaminated products from the Plainview company were found in Colorado

  • More and more nations are food-insecure

    Globalization, life style changes, and fierce competition among food producers make developing nations food-insecure; “Epidemics are a disastrous but unavoidable consequence that we can only hope to limit,” one expert says

  • Houseplant pest offers clues to potential new anthrax treatment

    A humble bacterium with a long name — Pectobacterium chrysanthemi (Dickya dadantii) — attacks, and often kills, the popular African violet, which is found in many urban and suburban back yards; it does so by competing with its host — the violet — for iron; Warwick University researchers find that the bacteria’s chemical pathway could be blocked or inhibited to prevent the bacterium from harvesting iron, essentially starving it; this work has major implications for the treatment of several virulent and even deadly mammalian infections including Anthrax

  • Monoclonal antibodies effective against bird flu, seasonal flu

    Worldwide, more than 250,000 deaths from seasonal influenza occur annually; if a breakout of avian flu occurs, the number of deaths is incalculable; scientists identify human monoclonal antibodies effective against bird and seasonal flu viruses

  • Woman dies of bird flu in Vietnam

    The World Health Organization reports that H5N1 has killed 254 people across the world since 2003; the latest victim is a Vietnamese woman, bringing the death toll from avian flu in Vietnam to 53 since the end of 2003 — the highest in the world

  • Food safety is in farm worker's hands -- literally

    Food safety experts says that the health and hygienic habits of migrant farms workers are an often-overlooked source of food borne illness

  • Food poisoning strike 25 percent of Americans each year

    Food poisoning affects an estimated 25 percent of Americans every year; calculations say there are 87 million cases every year, with 371,000 requiring hospitalizations and 5,700 dying

  • Regulators cannot cope with food counterfeiting, contamination

    New worry: Between the extremes of accidentally contaminated food and terrorism via intentional contamination, lies the counterfeiter, seeking not to harm but to hide the act for profit

  • Doomsday seed vault's stores are growing

    In 1903, U.S. farmers planted 578 varieties of beans; by 1983 just 32 varieties remained in seedbanks; 46 countries collaborate to rescue some 53,000 of the 100,000 crop samples identified as endangered

  • NASA study predicted outbreak of deadly virus

    Predictive tool is a blend of NASA and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration measurements of sea surface temperatures, precipitation, and vegetation cover to predict when and where an outbreak would occur