Zoonotic Infections News

Listeria monocytogenes is ubiquitous in the environment. It is a foodborne pathogen, but the infecting dose is unknown. Person-to-person transmission, other than from mother to fetus or directly to the newborn at the time of birth, is not believed to occur. With an incubation period of up to 2 months or more, it can be difficult to trace a food source; epid emiology is now being delineated with better investigative tools.

The voice says to call back. Someone at the CDC wants to discuss your application for the Epidemic Intelligence Service. Panic sets in. Did you forget to fill something out? Did you mess something up?

Each year, CDC officials and representatives from state health departments around the country conduct what amount to job interviews with members of the incoming class of the CDC’s Epidemic Intelligence Service.

Victoria Hall, DVM, MS, a first-year officer in the CDC’s Epidemic Intelligence Service, sat at a table in the hallway of a downtown Atlanta convention center and admitted that she felt a little nervous. Current and past EIS officers mingled nearby, filling the corridor with a clamor.

Innovate UK has awarded University of Plymouth researchers over half a million dollars to develop a new type of vaccine designed to stop the spread of emerging zoonotic pathogens in the animals themselves, specifically those that cause Rift Valley Fever Virus and Q Fever, according to a press release.

ATLANTA — A veterinarian in New York City was the first person in the United States to contract an avian influenza A virus from a cat, according to researchers.

Climate change is expected to increase the risk for the spread of numerous types of infectious diseases — including Lyme disease, Zika, diarrheal diseases and more — according to researchers.

The Ebola virus was first recognized as a human pathogen in 1976, when outbreaks of hemorrhagic fever occurred in areas of Sudan and Zaire between August and November of that year. These outbreaks were attributed to Ebola virus, a new filovirus agent. More than 40 years later, we know that Ebola virus persists in nonhuman animal reservoirs in the wilds of Africa and likely elsewhere, and that inadvertent human contact with these reservoir species can facilitate zoonosis, which is the transmission of an infectious agent, in this case Ebola virus, from nonhuman animals to humans. Once present in a human population, Ebola virus is highly transmissible through person-to-person contact and can rapidly spread through a population having no preexisting immunity to the virus. Because Ebola virus can trigger a massive inflammatory response, and its viral proteins mediate immune evasion processes, the infection can result in great lethality.

Rocky Mountain spotted fever can be deadly to both humans and dogs, but diagnosing a dog with the tickborne illness does not guarantee that the owner will be examined for it, even though he or she may have been exposed to the infection through the same environmental risk factors.

As WHO increases efforts to combat the endemic tropical disease yaws, which has resurged over the past 2 decades, researchers suggested that a One Health approach involving surveillance and treatment of infected pet monkeys may be needed to eradicate the disease.