ZKEA

Biological Warfare : Biological Terrorism : Emerging Diseases

Archived News
Week ending January 12th, 2005

HIV/AIDS is spreading at a devastating pace in Russia, with a new study showing an estimated 1 million people infected - three times the number officially reported - U.S. and Russian experts said Wednesday. A recently released 90-page report by Murray Feshbach and Cristina Galvin of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars urged Russian authorities to take aggressive steps to fight the epidemic. The study was sponsored by U.S. Agency for International Development.

According to official statistics, Russia has some 300,000 HIV-positive people. But Feshbach, as well as Russian experts, said the true number is closer to 1 million. The study estimated the number of AIDS deaths in Russia at 13,000, almost three times the official figure of 4,800.

If officials ignore the problem, "the consequences will be devastating to the society, family formation, to the military, labor productivity" within two to three years, Feshbach said by telephone from Washington...

Researchers have made an unexpectedly sudden advance in synthesizing long molecules of DNA, bringing them closer to the goal of redesigning genes and programming cells to make pharmaceuticals.

But the success also puts within reach the manufacture of small genomes, such as those of viruses and perhaps certain bacteria. Some biologists fear that the technique might be used to make the genome of the smallpox virus, one of the few pathogens that cannot easily be collected from the wild.

The advance, described in the Jan. 6 issue of the journal Nature by Dr. George M. Church of the Harvard Medical School and Dr. Xiaolian Gao of the University of Houston, involves the use of a new technique to synthesize a DNA molecule 14,500 chemical units in length. The molecule contained a string of 21 genes used by a harmless laboratory bacterium.

The full power of the technique is still being explored, but genomes like that of the smallpox virus - 186,000 chemical units long - seem well within reach. Dr. Church has completed the first part of a plan to synthesize the 777,000-unit genome of a small bacterium known as Mycoplasma mobile.

"This has the potential for a revolutionary impact in the ease of synthesis of large DNA molecules," said Dr. Richard Ebright, a molecular biologist at Rutgers University with an interest in bioterrorism.

"This will permit efficient and rapid synthesis of any select agent virus genome in very short order," he added, referring to the list of dangerous pathogens and toxins that possessors are required to register with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Dr. Ebright said any facility possessing the new DNA synthesis equipment should be assumed capable of making any virus on the select agent list.

The genetic sequences of smallpox and many other dangerous pathogens are easily obtained because they were deposited in public databases as an aid to medical researchers at a time when synthesizing large DNA molecules seemed prohibitively expensive or impossible... COMMENT COMMENT

Having extra copies of a gene that produces a blocking protein helps protect people from AIDS, a finding that may explain why some people are more susceptible to the disease than others, a new study reports.

researchers wondering why people from the same ancestry varied in their ability to resist HIV and AIDS found differences in the number of copies of the gene that encodes CCL3L1, a protein that blocks HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.

Researchers hope the finding, reported in Thursday's online issue of the journal Science, help them identify people who have a higher or lower susceptibility to the disease.

"Individual risk of acquiring HIV and experiencing rapid disease progression is not uniform within populations," said Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, director of National Institute of Allergy and Infections Disease, which funded the study...

9-year-old boy in Vietnam has died of bird flu, bringing the number of people in the country killed by the virus to 21, a doctor said Wednesday.

The boy from the southern Mekong Delta province of Tra Vinh was admitted to the Hospital for Tropical Diseases in Ho Chi Minh City early Tuesday morning and died later that day, hospital deputy director Tran Tinh Hien said.

"He was tested positive for H5N1 virus," Hien said, refering to the strain of the virus that is deadly to humans.

World health experts fear that bird flu might mutate and create the next influenza pandemic. So far, there has been no concrete evidence of human-to-human transmission of bird flu. Only Vietnam and Thailand have recorded human deaths from the virus.

Health officials are preparing to add another jab to the national baby immunisation programme which already sees infants given two injections containing six vaccinations by the age of four months.

Government advisers have given their support in principle to a vaccination against bacterial meningitis, septicaemia and pneumonia, infections which strike about 550 under-fives in England and Wales each year and may kill between 50 and 100.

But they are seeking assurances that parents would accept another jab for very small babies who already receive a five-in-one injection against a range of infections and one against meningitis C. Further work is also being done to determine the dosage and timing of the injection against pneumococcal infections, although there have already been trials giving infants this vaccine alongside the others at two, three and four months.

The Department of Health is anxious to allay what it regards as unfounded fears that babies might face immunisation overload if another jab were added...

A small fleet ventured out from a south Sri Lankan port on Wednesday - the first step in rebuilding the country's vital but devastated fishing industry. Seven boats left Mirissa and returned with a symbolic catch, some to be sent to President Chandrika Kumaratunga.

They hope she will eat the fish publicly to dispel fears that catches are contaminated by decomposing bodies. The tsunami killed more than 30,000 in Sri Lanka. The nation's Central Bank puts damage costs this year at $1.3bn. Between 800,000 and one million people are thought to have been displaced.

The BBC's Gina Wilkinson in Mirissa says many fishermen in Sri Lanka are still reluctant to leave the shore as they are worried that more huge waves may swamp the coast.

Many more Sri Lankans believe mistakenly that fish, a staple food in Sri Lanka, are contaminated with disease...

Vietnam may face fresh outbreaks of the deadly H5N1 bird flu virus next month as poultry is transported around the country ahead of the Lunar New Year celebrations in February, the World Health Organization said.

The WHO warning comes after a 16-year-old girl remained in a stable condition in Ho Chi Minh after doctors confirmed she was infected with the virus. "As avian influenza viruses become more active at cooler temperature, further poultry outbreaks, possibly accompanied by sporadic human cases, can be anticipated," the U.N. health agency said...