Skip to main content

Home/ WSU Virology/ Group items tagged measles

Rss Feed Group items tagged

Filter: All | Bookmarks | Topics Simple Middle
Casey Finnerty

Flu Deaths Reach Epidemic Level, but May Be at Peak - NYTimes.com - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...levels-but-may-be-peaking.html

virology influenza microbiology

shared by Casey Finnerty on 13 Jan 13 - Cached
  • Although the report supported getting flu shots, it said that new vaccines offering lifelong protection against all flu strains, instead of annual partial protection against a mix-and-match set, must be created.
  • “Vaccine effectiveness” is a very different metric from vaccine-virus match, which is done in a lab. Vaccine efficacy is measured by interviewing hundreds of sick or recovering patients who had positive flu tests and asking whether and when they had received shots.
  • During the 2009 swine flu pandemic, many elderly Americans had natural protection, presumably from flus they caught in the 1930s or ’40s.
  • ...12 more annotations...
  • “Think about that,” Dr. Osterholm said. “Even though they were old, they were still protected. We’ve got to figure out how to capture that kind of immunity — which current vaccines do not.”
  • Dr. Bresee acknowledged the difficulties, saying: “If I had the perfect answer as to how to make a better flu vaccine, I’d probably get a Nobel Prize.”
  • a preliminary study rated this year’s vaccine as 62 percent effective, even though it is a good match for the most worrisome virus circulating.
  • urged Americans to keep getting flu shots.
  • Even though deaths stepped — barely — into epidemic territory for the first time last Saturday, the C.D.C. officials expressed no alarm, and said it was possible that new flu infections were peaking in some parts of the country.
  • Epidemiologists count how many death certificates are filed in a flu year, compare the number with normal years, and estimate what percentage were probably flu-related.
  • The C.D.C.’s vaccine effectiveness study bore out the point of view of a report released last year by the University of Minnesota’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy. It said that the shot’s effectiveness had been “overpromoted and overhyped,” said Michael T. Osterholm, the center’s director.
  • At the same time, he praised the C.D.C. for measuring vaccine effectiveness in midseason. “We’re the only ones in the world who have data like that,” he said.
  • “To get a vaccine across the ‘Valley of Death’ is likely to cost $1 billion,”
  • the metric means the shot “reduces by 62 percent your chance of getting a flu so bad that you have to go to a doctor or hospital.”
  • “far from perfect, but by far the best tool we have to prevent influenza.”
  • Most vaccinations given in childhood for threats like measles and diphtheria are 90 percent effective or better. But flu viruses mutate so fast that they must be remade annually.
Casey Finnerty

Measles case confirmed at University of Minnesota | Minnesota Public Radio News - 0 views

www.mprnews.org/...niversity-of-minnesota-measles

measles

shared by Casey Finnerty on 29 Jan 15 - No Cached
  • The U of M requires students to be vaccinated before they can enroll.
Haram LEE

BMC Cancer | Full text | Oncolytic Targeting of Androgen-sensitive Prostate Tumor by th... - 4 views

www.biomedcentral.com/...43

vriology Oncolytic virotherapy RSV

shared by Haram LEE on 27 Sep 12 - No Cached
Trevor F liked it
  • Haram LEE on 27 Sep 12
     
    Oncolytic virotherapy for cancer treatment utilizes viruses for selective infection and death of cancer cells without any adverse effect on normal cells. We previously reported that the human respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is a novel oncolytic virus against androgen-independent PC-3 human prostate cancer cells.
  • ...2 more comments...
  • Haram LEE on 27 Sep 12
     
    Is there any other virus can using for Oncolytic virotherapy? - Oncolytic viruses identified to date are: adenovirus, reovirus, herpes simplex virus (HSV), Newcastle disease virus (NDV), vaccinia virus, myxoma virus, influenza virus, measles virus, coxsackievirus and vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV) (Anticancer oncolytic activity of respiratory syncytial virus., http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?term=Anti-cancer%20oncolytic%20activity%20of%20respiratory%20syncytial%20virus)
  • Haram LEE on 27 Sep 12
     
    Why also using xenograft, not only for cell-culture method? - A human prostate tumor xenograft model (30) was used to examine the oncolytic function of RSV in vivo (Figure 2). -We also investigated the efficacy of intraperitoneally (I.P) delivered RSV for causing tumor regression and determined that intraperitoneally injected RSV also rendered significant reduction in the tumor growth compared to the growth of control, medium-treated tumors (Figure 2c). The significant tumor regression by intraperitoneally delivered RSV is shown in Figure 2d. Similar results were obtained with tumors grown in the dorsal flank (Supplementary Figure S2). Therefore, the RSV-responsive restriction of tumor growth at two sites (ear and flank) demonstrates the versatility of RSV in conferring oncolysis in vivo at different anatomical regions. (Anticancer oncolytic activity of respiratory syncytial virus., http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?term=Anti-cancer%20oncolytic%20activity%20of%20respiratory%20syncytial%20virus)
  • Haram LEE on 27 Sep 12
     
    How Oncolytic virus control the inflammation? - Oncolytic virus treatment induced at least a twofold increase or decrease in the expression of 50 genes relative to expression in the PBS-treated tumors (Supplementary Table 1, available online). Of these 50 genes, 48 displayed an increase in expression in the oncolytic virus - treated tumors compared with the controltreated tumors, suggesting that oncolytic virus treatment induced an inflammatory response - To confirm the role of the immune response in oncolytic virus - induced vascular hyperpermeability, we evaluated changes in oncolytic virus - induced vascular leakage in tumor-bearing rats that had been treated with cyclophosphamide before oncolytic virus injection. In addition to its immunosuppressive effects, cyclophosphamide blocks infl ammation and reduces viral clearance, both of which increase the propagation of oncolytic viruses, thereby enhancing therapeutic effi cacy of oncolytic viruses. (Effect of Tumor Microenvironment Modulation on the Efficacy of Oncolytic Virus Therapy, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?term=Effect%20of%20Tumor%20Microenvironment%20Modulation%20on%20the%20Efficacy%20of%20Oncolytic%20Virus%20Therapy)
  • Haram LEE on 27 Sep 12
Casey Finnerty

Reassessing Flu Shots as the Season Draws Near - NYTimes.com - 3 views

well.blogs.nytimes.com/...shots-as-the-season-draws-near

virology microbiology influenza vaccination

shared by Casey Finnerty on 06 Nov 12 - No Cached
  • “I say, ‘Use this vaccine,’ ” he said. “The safety profile is actually quite good. But we have oversold it. Use it — but just know it’s not going to work nearly as well as everyone says.”
  • “Not having evidence doesn’t prove it doesn’t work; we just don’t know,” said Dr. Roger Thomas, a Cochrane Collaboration coordinator for the University of Calgary in Alberta, who was an author of both of the reviews. “The intelligent decision would be to have large, publicly funded independent trials.”
  • “Does it work as well as the measles vaccine? No, and it’s not likely to. But the vaccine works,” Dr. Joseph Bresee, chief of epidemiology and prevention in the C.D.C.’s influenza division, said. And research is advancing to improve the effectiveness of the vaccine.
  • ...3 more annotations...
  • Another option for those who want to reduce their risk of influenza and flulike infections may be simply this: Wash your hands more often. There is good evidence this works.
    • Sarah Muncy
      Sarah Muncy on 15 Nov 12
       
      Whaaa? Wait, what? That's like selling elephant insurance. Sure, we can't PROVE it's working, but that doesn't mean it's NOT. Is this true? I never imagined data wasn't there to show vaccines work to this degree- I'm so confused.
  • “It does not protect as promoted. It’s all a sales job: it’s all public relations.”
Casey Finnerty

Dr. Donald A. Henderson, Who Helped End Smallpox, Dies at 87 - The New York Times - 1 views

www.nytimes.com/...d-end-smallpox-dies-at-87.html

smallpox vaccine

shared by Casey Finnerty on 22 Aug 16 - No Cached
  • Dr. Donald A. Henderson, a leader of one of mankind’s greatest public health triumphs, the eradication of smallpox, died on Friday in Towson, Md. He was 87.
  • died in a hospice of complications of a hip fracture, including infection with antibiotic-resistant staphylococcus, a dangerous pathogen he had himself researched and raised alarms about
  • The last known case was found in a hospital cook in Somalia in 1977.
  • ...14 more annotations...
  • The only other disease to have been banished from the earth is rinderpest, a little-known relative of measles that kills hoofed animals and once caused widespread starvation in Africa; it was eradicated in 2011.
  • Smallpox, caused by the variola virus, was long one of mankind’s most terrifying scourges.
  • it killed almost a third of its victims, often through pneumonia or brain inflammation.
  • Many others were left blind from corneal ulcerations or severely disfigured by pockmarks.
  • Because it killed 80 percent of the American Indians who caught it, it was a major factor in the European conquest of the New World.
  • In 1796, Dr. Edward Jenner, an English physician, infected a young boy with cowpox taken from a blister on a milkmaid’s hand. Cowpox, a mild disease, protected those who had it from smallpox, and the modern vaccine era began.
  • Dr. Henderson quickly realized that trying to vaccinate vast populations was futile and switched to “ring vaccination.”
  • Dr. Foege, who is considered the father of this tactic, said it was “invented by accident” during a 1967 Nigerian outbreak when he had very little vaccine on hand.
  • “The first night, we asked ourselves what we would do if we were a virus bent on immortality,”
  • In 1977, success in hand, Dr. Henderson became dean of the Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health.“He was an imposing guy — physically big and very confident,” said Dr. Michael J. Klag, the school’s current dean, who was a student in that era. “He did not suffer fools gladly, and you were never sure if you were a fool or not.”
  • He gloomily foresaw failure for most other disease-elimination campaigns. The “siren song of eradication,” he once wrote, had led to goals that were more “evangelical” than attainable.
  • The problem, he would explain, was that each viral foe was so different. Smallpox had many weaknesses to exploit; it had no animal host. Every case can be found because victims have pox on their faces, and one vaccination provides lifetime immunity.
  • In 2011, when Bill Gates threw the full weight of his foundation into fighting polio, he struggled to explain how he would overcome such obstacles and, at the end of an interview, turned to an aide and said aloud, “I’ve got to get my D. A. Henderson response down better.”
  • The campaign, many experts have noted, succeeded just in time. A few years later, the virus that causes AIDS spread across Africa. Because the live smallpox vaccine can grow in an immune-compromised person into a huge, rotting, ultimately fatal lesion, it would have been impossible to deploy it.
1 - 7 of 7
Showing 20▼ items per page