Outbreak News Radio

The modern lifestyle of those in the developed world and it's emphasis on hyper-cleanliness, is taking a toll on children's lifelong health--Kids not being exposed to good microbes, the over-use of antibiotics and the like have resulted in rises in asthma, allergies and a lengthy list of other chronic conditions. Coauthor of the book, Let Them Eat Dirt --Saving Your Child from an Oversanitized Wor...

Just in the past week, I reported on cyclospora outbreaks in Ontario, Canada and Texas and an increase in cases in New York City on the website, outbreaknewstoday.com. Parasitologist and author of the book, Parasites: Tales of Humanity's Most Unwelcome Guests, Rosemary Drisdelle joined me to discuss Cyclospora in the latest installment of Parasites 101 on the Outbreak News Interviews podcast.

CIDRAP Director and author of the book, Deadliest Enemy: Our War Against Killer Germs, Michael Osterholm, PhD, MPH discussed this investigation from nearly four decades ago. In 1980, 890 cases of Toxic Shock Syndrome (TSS) were reported and nine out of 10 cases were associated with menstruation and linked to the use of higher absorbency tampons. Today, TSS is relatively rare, but but serious clini...

Epidemiologist with the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Ryan Maddox, PhD, joined me to discuss Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD) and other human and animal prion diseases or transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs).

A relatively rare tapeworm has popped up in several patients in Alberta, Canada in the past few years, which may not sound like much; however, the only other human case in Canada was in 1928 in Manitoba. The parasite is called Echinococcus multilocularis and it appearance in Alberta has caught the attention of some infectious disease specialists. Professor of Medicine and infectious disease expert...

Who said health care must be expensive and essentially dominated by the US government and insurance companies? Free market options are out there and this sector is growing as the government-insurance cartel crumbles before our eyes. Wichita, Kansas family physician, Dr. Josh Umbehr joined me to talk about his Direct Primary Care Clinic, which is essentially a membership service, providing health c...

Parasitology teacher and writer and the author of the book, Parasites: Tales of Humanity's Most Unwelcome Guests, Rosemary Drisdelle joined me on the episode to discuss the soil-transmitted helminth, the giant intestinal roundworm--Ascaris lumbricoides. Today's episode will be the first of a series of podcasts I'd like to call Parasites 101, which we'll try to on a weekly basis.

One of the main issues with Lyme disease is the testing, or the diagnostics as the current two-tier diagnostic approach can be inaccurate up to fifty percent of the time. Professor in the School of Medicine at Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center and inventor of the Global Lyme Diagnostics platform, Richard Marconi, PhD joined me to discuss this new test for Lyme disease. Learn more abo...

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says "Hepatitis" means inflammation of the liver. The liver is a vital organ that processes nutrients, filters the blood, and fights infections. When the liver is inflamed or damaged, its function can be affected. Heavy alcohol use, toxins, some medications, and certain medical conditions can cause hepatitis. However, hepatitis is most often cau...

Since the Haiti cholera outbreak began in October 2010, months after the Jan. 12, 2010 earthquake, more than 800,000 cases have been reported, including about 9500 deaths. Although the numbers have decreased dramatically over the years, the island nation still sees thousands of cases annually. Today, cholera outbreaks are reported in Kenya, Nigeria, the DRC , Tanzania and most notably Yemen where...

Lyme disease is a tickborne disease caused by the bacterium Borrelia burgdorferii in which antibiotics are the standard treatment. However, this type of treatment is not always effective and relapses occur. Researchers in Connecticut have been studying the use of Stevia for the treatment of Lyme disease as an alternative to routine antibiotics. Professor and Department Chair Department of Biology...

Visiting Scientist at the University of Guelph, Jason "The Germ Guy" Tetro, joined me to discuss mumps and the reasons it has made a comeback. Jason gives a thorough talk on mumps and talks about why mumps has seen a resurgence, as he explains in his recent article in Huffington Post Canada, "The trouble wasn't due to the vaccine. Instead, it was the virus. It had changed."

In this Aug. 2013 interview following a correspondence published in the journal, Nature, Professor of Microbiology and Immunology at Columbia University and founder of Virology Blog, Vincent Racaniello, PhD explains what gain-of function experiments are and went on to make his case of why he was for doing it. I also introduced some of the arguments against performing these experiments to the promi...

H1N1, H7N9, H5N1--we hear this "alphanumeric" description of various influenza, or flu viruses all the time. In this short clip from an older interview, Professor of Microbiology and Immunology at Columbia University and founder of Virology Blog, Vincent Racaniello, PhD explains more about the Hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA).

The Dean for the National School of Tropical Medicine, Baylor College of Medicine, Dr Peter Hotez is concerned about measles in his state of Texas, so much that he is raising the alarm by predicting a measles outbreak could happen as early as the winter or spring of 2018. In an article published in PLoS Medicine last fall, Hotez writes: Measles vaccination coverage in certain Texas counties is dan...

According to an American Cancer Society annual report, in 2017 there will be an estimated 1.7 million new cancer cases diagnosed and more than 600,000 cancer deaths in the US. Of this total, a quarter million breast cancer diagnoses and 40,000 deaths are estimated in US women in 2017--the most common cancer reported in women, accounting for nearly a third of all cancers in women. Deputy Chief Medi...

There is likely no bigger accomplishment in medicine and public health that has saved so many lives and prevented so much misery over the decades as the introduction of vaccines. In the U.S. alone, between 1963 and 2015 nearly 200 million cases of polio, measles, mumps, rubella, varicella, adenovirus, rabies and hepatitis A — and approximately 450,000 deaths from these diseases — were prevented by...

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), group B strep is the leading cause of sepsis and meningitis in a newborn's first week of life. July is International Group B strep awareness month and retired obstetrician and infectious disease specialist, Dr James A McGregor joined me to discuss a variety of topics related to Group B strep. Dr McGregor also serves on the board of...

Scientist and engineer, Sarah Ferrari, who is a member of the Alliance to Prevent Legionnaires' Disease, a coalition of subject matter experts and stakeholders formed to promote best practices on Legionnaires' Disease prevention joined me in the second part of this interview on Legionnaires' disease and Legionella.

Legionnaires' disease is caused by the bacterium, Legionella. The bacterium was named after an outbreak in 1976, when many people who went to a Philadelphia convention of the American Legion got sick with pneumonia. In the United States, approximately 5,000 cases of Legionnaires' disease are reported annually. However, Legionnaires' disease is likely underdiagnosed and the true numbers are likely...

An article published last year in the European Journal of Microbiology and Immunology, an international, peer-reviewed online journal, was the first to demonstrate the presence of Borrelia biofilm in human infected skin tissues making the spirochete resistant to treatment as the allows it to "hide out" from antibiotics. Study lead author and Professor and Department Chair at the Department of Biol...

Researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania have found evidence that the most difficult C. difficile cases, known as multiple recurring C. difficile infections (mrCDI), are rapidly becoming more common. This is documented in a recent study published in the journal, Annals of Internal Medicine. Lead author and Professor of Medicine in the Gastroenterology Divi...

A recent study published in the Entomological Society of America's Journal of Medical Entomology demonstrates the duration of attachment of a single nymphal blacklegged tick (Ixodes scapularis) needed for the tick to be likely to transmit the bacterial species Borrelia mayonii, identified in 2016, is 48 hours or more, according to the study. By 72 hours, however, likelihood of transmission has ris...

23andMe is a popular company that offers genomic analysis for customers using a saliva sample. They offer ancestry testing and health and ancestry testing for 100-200 dollars. My guest for this show, health law professor at the University of South Florida College of Public Health, Katherine Drabiak, JD warns in a new article, "Caveat Emptor: How the Intersection of Big Data and Consumer Genomics E...

Rabies is among the deadliest communicable diseases in the world with a case-fatality rate of ~100% with out post exposure treatment and vaccination. People usually get rabies from the bite of a rabid animal. It is also possible, but quite rare, that people may get rabies if infectious material from a rabid animal, such as saliva, gets directly into their eyes, nose, mouth, or a wound. While human...