How many diseases are preventable by vaccines?
The power of vaccines cannot be underestimated. Take, for example, Poliomyelitis, which was a significant problem 70 years ago – and is now close to becoming a disease of the past. Not that long ago, smallpox was completely eradicated through the use of a vaccine.
As the world celebrates the imminent arrival of several COVID-19 vaccines, we might ask how many diseases are preventable by vaccines as of 2020.
Which diseases haven’t got a vaccine yet?
Of the 361 generic infectious diseases that affect humans, only 62 (17%) are preventable by vaccines. Over 100 of the remainder are caused by fungi and pa...
Source: GIDEON blog - December 17, 2020 Category: Databases & Libraries Authors: Kristina Symes Tags: News Therapy Source Type: blogs
Why are mRNA vaccines so exciting?
The very first vaccines for COVID-19 to complete Phase 3 testing are an entirely new type: mRNA vaccines. Vaccines of this type have never before been approved for use in any disease. How do they differ from traditional vaccines, and what makes them so exciting?
How traditional vaccines work
The main goal of a vaccine for a particular infectious agent, such as the virus that causes COVID-19, is to teach the immune system what that virus looks like. Once educated, the immune system will vigorously attack the actual virus, if it ever enters the body.
Viruses contain a core of genes made of DNA or RNA wrapped in a coat of pro...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - December 10, 2020 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Anthony Komaroff, MD Tags: Coronavirus and COVID-19 Health Vaccines Source Type: blogs
Let ’s end Polio
An Egyptian stele thought to represent a polio victim. 18th Dynasty (1403–1365 BC).
Poliomyelitis dates back to ancient times, as captured in this 14th century BC Egyptian carving, detailing a typical symptom of atrophy in one or more of the limbs.
The modern name is directly derived from Ancient Greek, poliós meaning ‘grey’ and myelós meaning ‘marrow’, the latter signifying the effect on the grey matter of the spinal cord.
But while the ancient Egyptians and Greeks knew about the disease, it wasn’t clinically described until the late 18th century (AD), by the English doctor Michael Underwood. The di...
Source: GIDEON blog - October 25, 2020 Category: Databases & Libraries Authors: Kristina Symes Tags: Epidemiology News Source Type: blogs
TWiV 671: Prizes, polio, and a pandemic puzzle
Daniel Griffin provides a clinical report on COVID-19, then Amy joins us to discuss the 2020 Chemistry Nobel Prize for gene editing using CRISPR/Cas9, continuing circulation of poliovirus in Afghanistan, inborn errors of interferon in patients with severe COVID-19, and listener questions. Click arrow to playDownload TWiV 671 (102 MB .mp3, 170 min)Subscribe (free): iTunes, Google Podcasts, RSS, email Become […] (Source: virology blog)
Source: virology blog - October 12, 2020 Category: Virology Authors: Vincent Racaniello Tags: This Week in Virology coronavirus COVID-19 diagnostic test inborn errors interferon lateral flow assay pandemic polio eradication poliomyelitis SARS-CoV-2 SNIP vaccine viral viruses Source Type: blogs
When Will this $%!# Pandemic End?
The COVID-19 pandemic has had a worldwide effect for what seems like an eternity. After shelter-in-place orders became more prevalent in March, most people probably didn’t think they’d still be wearing masks in October. So the question remains, when will the pandemic end?
It turns out there are quite a few factors that contribute to the rise and fall of a pandemic, some within our control, some that are not. An outbreak becomes a pandemic when it meets two criteria, first, it spreads rapidly and widely, and second, it must qualify as a severe disease. If either of these factors change, it is no longer consi...
Source: Conversations with Dr Greene - October 5, 2020 Category: Child Development Authors: Alan Greene MD Tags: Dr. Greene's Blog Coronavirus COVID COVID-19 COVID-19 Feature Source Type: blogs
Vaccines for COVID-19 moving closer
As the world reels from illnesses and deaths due to COVID-19, the race is on for a safe, effective, long-lasting vaccine to help the body block the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. The three vaccine approaches discussed here are among the first to be tested clinically in the United States.
How vaccines induce immunity: The starting line
In 1796, in a pastoral corner of England, and during a far more feudal and ethically less enlightened time, Edward Jenner, an English country surgeon, inoculated James Phipps, his gardener’s eight-year-old son, with cowpox pustules obtained from the arm of a milkmaid. It was widely believed ...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - July 21, 2020 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Shiv Pillai, PhD, MBBS Tags: Coronavirus and COVID-19 Health Infectious diseases Vaccines Source Type: blogs
Covid-19 Reuters Newsmaker Broadcast with William Haseltine
I live-tweeted a fascinating and perhaps rather depressing meeting with William Haseltine via a Reuters Newsmaker Broadcast. His talk was upbeat but the message does not offer a positive outlook unless we can collaborate internationally to identify, trace, and isolate and go back to early antivirals to treat people urgently. A vaccine will probably never be found, we must stay on top of this virus when we get communities under control. Moreover, we must recognise that another emergent pathogen could appear any time.
These are essentially my notes from Haseltines’s talk.
Might we ever achieve herd immunity?
There is n...
Source: David Bradley Sciencebase - Songs, Snaps, Science - May 20, 2020 Category: Science Authors: David Bradley Tags: Sciencebase Source Type: blogs
Covid-19 Reuters Q & A with William Haseltine
I live-tweeted a fascinating and perhaps rather depressing meeting with William Haseltine via a Reuters Newsmaker Broadcast. His talk was upbeat but the message does not offer a positive outlook unless we can collaborate internationally to identify, trace, and isolate and go back to early antivirals to treat people urgently. A vaccine will probably never be found, we must stay on top of this virus when we get communities under control. Moreover, we must recognise that another emergent pathogen could appear any time.
These are essentially my notes from Haseltines’s talk.
Might we ever achieve herd immunity?
There is n...
Source: David Bradley Sciencebase - Songs, Snaps, Science - May 20, 2020 Category: Science Authors: David Bradley Tags: Sciencebase Source Type: blogs
Will This Novel Virus Revive Older Ones?
Jeffrey A. SingerAs I recently wrotehere, and spoke abouthere, bans on elective surgery invoked by governors across the country in response to the COVID-19 pandemic have caused many people to suffer and even possibly face fatal consequences due to delays in necessary medical care. But there are other reasons why the public health emergency has the potential to generate secondary public health crises.In some cases people are avoiding doctors ’ offices and emergency rooms because they worry about handling theexpense at a time they have seen their income, and perhaps their savings, vanish during the current econom...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - May 9, 2020 Category: American Health Authors: Jeffrey A. Singer Source Type: blogs
The Problem With “Herd Immunity” as a COVID-19 Strategy
This article originally appeared on his blog here.
The post The Problem With “Herd Immunity” as a COVID-19 Strategy appeared first on The Health Care Blog. (Source: The Health Care Blog)
Source: The Health Care Blog - May 5, 2020 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Christina Liu Tags: COVID-19 Health Policy Dave deBronkart e-Patient Dave e-Patient Dave DeBronkart Pandemic Source Type: blogs
No Relationship Between Notifiable Diseases and Immigrant Populations
Alex Nowrasteh andAndrew C. ForresterThe international spread of the SARS ‐CoV‐2 virus that causes the disease COVID-19 has prompted many governments to close their borders. Immigration policy plays an important role in limiting the international spread of contagious diseases.Prior to the COVID-19 crisis,several commentators were concerned that immigrants – especially illegal immigrants – were spreading serious diseases in the United States. This blog post is the first in a series to answer the question of whether immigrants spread serious notifiable diseases other than COVID-19 in the United States. This ...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - April 13, 2020 Category: American Health Authors: Alex Nowrasteh, Andrew C. Forrester Source Type: blogs
COVID-19: What can we learn from history?
I was quite young, but I could sense the unease in my mother when she first sent me off to elementary school amidst an uncertain risk of paralytic polio in the 1950 ’s era. She maintained her frightened countenance until 1960 when the Sabin vaccine miraculously appeared. Many years later, my wife, a pediatrician, had intubated […]Find jobs at Careers by KevinMD.com. Search thousands of physician, PA, NP, and CRNA jobs now. Learn more. (Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog)
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - April 6, 2020 Category: General Medicine Authors: < span itemprop="author" > < a href="https://www.kevinmd.com/blog/post-author/lawrence-hurwitz" rel="tag" > Lawrence Hurwitz, MD < /a > < /span > Tags: Conditions COVID-19 coronavirus Infectious Disease Source Type: blogs
Why follow a vaccine schedule?
Right now, many people are hoping for a vaccine to protect against the new coronavirus. While that’s still on the horizon, new research suggests that families who do vaccinate their children may not be following the recommended schedule.
Vaccines are given on a schedule for a reason: to protect children from vaccine-preventable disease. Experts designed the schedule so that children get protection when they need it — and the doses are timed so the vaccine itself can have the best effect. When parents don’t follow the schedule, their children may not be protected.
And yet, many parents do not follow the schedule.
A th...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - March 26, 2020 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Claire McCarthy, MD Tags: Adolescent health Children's Health Parenting Vaccines Source Type: blogs
Technology and Cooperation Help Fight the Pandemic
Chelsea FollettThe pandemic caused by the new coronavirus (COVID-19) from Wuhan, China, is now a serious and global problem. And that problem has been made even worse by a culture of constant alarmism making it hard to distinguish real threats from exaggerated claims, as the well ‐known science writer Matt Ridley has pointed out. But even when faced with the genuine threat of a pandemic, there are reasons to take heart and think that humanity will rise to the challenges ahead.First, humanity has never been better prepared technologically to deal with a pandemic. We are fortunate to live in an age o...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - March 13, 2020 Category: American Health Authors: Chelsea Follett Source Type: blogs
The real cost, and longer term implications, of the Wuhan coronavirus
It ' s too soon to know for sure how the tale of the novel coronavirus will play out,but at this point we have a pretty good idea. A stipulation in both of the scenarios at the linked essay is that yeah, it gets loose into the wild and eventually can show up anywhere in the world. I think that ' s pretty much definitely going to happen if it hasn ' t already.Scenario number 1, and most likely, in my view, it will just be one more virus that causes what amounts to a common cold and in a few people who are otherwise debilitated goes on to be complicated by pneumonia. In that case, for a year or two it will circulate as a nov...
Source: Stayin' Alive - February 5, 2020 Category: American Health Source Type: blogs
