Infectious causes of chronic disease
Category archives for Infectious causes of chronic disease
The emergence of “nodding disease”
Posted by Tara C. Smith on March 27, 2012 The emergence of “new” diseases is a complicated issue. “New” diseases often just means “new to biomedical science.” Viruses like Ebola and HIV were certainly circulating in Africa in animal reservoirs for decades, and probably millenia, before they came to the attention of physicians via human infections. Hantavirus in the American southwest has likely infected…
Is the HPV vaccine “weak science?” (Hint: no)
Posted by Tara C. Smith on November 15, 2011 Oh, Discover. You’re such a tease. You have Ed and Carl and Razib and Phil and Sean, an (all-male, ahem) cluster of science bloggy goodness. But then you also fawn over HIV deniers Lynn Margulis and Peter Duesberg. Why can’t you just stick with the science and keep the denial out?* But no, now they’ve…
Does bestiality increase your risk of penile cancer?
Posted by Tara C. Smith on November 13, 2011 Aah, the things one learns when awake at 3AM on a Saturday night. Via a few different Tweeps, I ran across this article from Men’s Health magazine, titled “Urgent Warning: Sex with Animals Causes Cancer.” I probably should have just stopped there. But no, I read the magazine article, which states: Brazilian researchers polled nearly…
Hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS): history and implications
Posted by Tara C. Smith on June 24, 2011 Part One It appears that the E. coli O104 sproutbreak is starting to wind down, with more than 3,500 cases diagnosed to date and 39 deaths. Though sprouts remain the key source of the bacterium, a recent report also documents that human carriers helped to spread the organism (via H5N1 blog). In this case, it…
Hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS) in history–part 4: the bigger picture
Posted by Tara C. Smith on June 23, 2011 As I’ve laid out this week (
Hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS) in history–part 3
Posted by Tara C. Smith on June 22, 2011 I left off yesterday with the initial discovery of “Vero toxin,” a toxin produced by E. coli (also called “Shiga toxin” or “Shiga-like toxin”). Though this may initially seem unconnected to hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS), the discovery of this cytotoxin paved the way for a clearer understanding of the etiology of this syndrome, as well…
Hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS) in history–part 2
Posted by Tara C. Smith on June 21, 2011 As I mentioned yesterday, the epidemiology of hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS) was murky for several decades after it was first defined in the literature in 1955. In the ensuing decades, HUS was associated with a number of infectious agents, leading to the general belief that it was a “multifactorial disease”–one that had components of genetics…
Hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS) in history–part 1
Posted by Tara C. Smith on June 20, 2011 It appears that the E. coli O104 sproutbreak is starting to wind down, with more than 3,500 cases diagnosed to date and 39 deaths. Though sprouts remain the key source of the bacterium, a recent report also documents that human carriers helped to spread the organism (via H5N1 blog). In this case, it was a…
The importance of gut flora
Posted by Tara C. Smith on July 13, 2010 Blogging from Atlanta at ICEID, the perfect venue to highlight today’s story in the NY Times by Carl Zimmer discussing gut microbes in health and disease–including an introduction focusing on fecal transplants to treat Clostridium difficile infections. If you’re at ICEID, be sure to swing by several posters in both sessions today showing new work…
Is There a Viral Cause for Idiopathic Pulmonary Arterial Hypertension?
Posted by Tara C. Smith on April 29, 2010 Student guest post Dayna Groskreutz Pulmonary hypertension (PH) refers to a condition in which there is high blood pressure in the vessels carrying blood from the heart to the lungs. Pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) is a subset of PH referring specifically to an increase in the pressure within the pulmonary arteries (rather than the pulmonary…