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Casey Finnerty

Why Norovirus Crops Up on Cruises - NYTimes.com - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...virus-crops-up-on-cruises.html

microbiology norovirus

shared by Casey Finnerty on 11 Feb 14 - No Cached
  • Over the past five years, an average of about 14 cruise ships a year have had outbreaks of diarrheal illness, and the culprit is almost always norovirus
  • The best way to avoid it is prevention, and the best prevention is hand washing.
  • The problem, he said, is passengers. “If Grandma is sick when she gets on, she’s going on the cruise anyway,” Dr. Vinjé said. “And that’s how the virus gets onboard. Then it lands on handrails and doorknobs, and the transmission continues.”
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • regardless of the origin, once onboard, the illness spreads widely. He says the reason is failure to clean restrooms properly.
Casey Finnerty

Rare Fungal Meningitis Outbreak Spreads To Six States : Shots - Health Blog : NPR - 0 views

www.npr.org/...outbreak-spreads-to-six-states

microbiology fungi

shared by Casey Finnerty on 05 Feb 14 - No Cached
  • The drug was contaminated with the spores of a common leaf mold — nobody knows how.
  • Five patients have died.
    • Casey Finnerty
      Casey Finnerty on 05 Feb 14
       
      As of 2012-10-15, 203 cases, 15 deaths.
  • Compounding pharmacies, which provide up to 10 percent of U.S. pharmaceuticals, are more loosely regulated than traditional drug companies. As is common, NECC is licensed by a state pharmacy board, which doesn't have the staff to conduct regular inspections. The company has been cited for contamination problems in the past, as the Boston Globe reports.
  • ...7 more annotations...
  • Surprisingly, the FDA says it has no idea how many doses of the tainted medicine have been shipped out.
  • methylprednisolone
  • The incubation period of fungal meningitis may be as long as four weeks.
  • Dr. April Pettit
  • People don't get Apergillus infections unless they have severely compromised immunity.
  • Pettit learned the man had gotten a spinal injection a couple of weeks earlier. She put two and two together and notified state health authorities.
  • There's one lucky aspect of this disaster: Unlike more common forms of meningitis, this type can't be passed from person to person.
Casey Finnerty

Meningitis From Tainted Drugs Puts Patients, Doctors In Quandary : Shots - Health News ... - 0 views

www.npr.org/...s-patients-doctors-in-quandary

microbiology fungi

shared by Casey Finnerty on 05 Feb 14 - No Cached
  • 14,000 Americans
  • alert to illness among patients who have received injections of hundreds of other products
  • the number must run into the tens of thousands.
  • ...14 more annotations...
  • it was really a mini-pharmaceutical manufacturer, not the pharmacy it was licensed to be.
  • 1,200 different drugs
  • Apparently, all of this has been caused by contamination of drugs by a black mold called Exserohilum rostratum, which is common in the environment but almost unheard of as a cause of human disease.
  • For instance, on 13 occasions, they said, New England Compounding shipped out vials of drugs in three suspect lots before getting back results of their own tests confirming the drugs were sterile.
  • "indicated a failure ... to sterilize products for even the minimum amount of time necessary to ensure sterility,"
  • The firm's premises were not clean
  • medications were not labeled with individual patients' names
  • he may harbor a fungal infection that could kill him, there's no proof that he does — and there may never be.
  • many anxious patients are undergoing painful spinal taps and some are getting antifungal drugs that can damage the kidneys and liver.
  • The caution is warranted. This type of fungal infection can smolder for weeks and months before exploding into meningitis or causing massive strokes.
  • "It causes a quandary for the infectious disease doc to figure out, well, should this patient receive treatment at all?" O'Connell says. "Should they receive full-boat treatment, which would be an IV? Could they instead just be watched very closely with daily phone calls and visits to the office? We just don't know."
  • "Should we do lumbar punctures on those kinds of people so that we can anticipate those that are going to get symptomatic later and beat the fungus to it?" Schaffner wonders. "That is, initiate treatment much earlier, thus averting tissue damage, particularly those devastating strokes."
  • When to stop is also uncertain.
  • six months, maybe longer.
Casey Finnerty

600 fall ill on cruise ship - chicagotribune.com - 0 views

www.chicagotribune.com/...lness-20140126,0,2482380.story

microbiology virology norovirus

shared by Casey Finnerty on 30 Jan 14 - No Cached
  • Passengers staggered off a Royal Caribbean ship reeking of vomit and diarrhea
Casey Finnerty

Cruise Ship Illness: Why Are Ships So Prone to Norovirus Outbreaks? - 0 views

news.nationalgeographic.com/...an-nation-health-science-virus

microbiology virology norovirus

shared by Casey Finnerty on 29 Jan 14 - No Cached
  • The industrial-size servings of food on a cruise ship with hundreds of passengers can be particularly worrisome, since once the virus enters the food it can spread rapidly. Food can also get more easily contaminated with the virus if it sits out for several hours, as is often the case with buffet-style meals.
  • And so many people being in one place eases the virus's spread. "In close quarters it doesn't get away, everything's concentrated," Zimring says.
  • The best defense against gastrointestinal disease, Zimring says, is to wash and sanitize your hands constantly
  • ...3 more annotations...
  • try to be the first person there at the buffet
  • Don't eat tepid food.
  • avoid buffet meals entirely
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